Is "having my tea" a northern thing?

[Queenoftheblitz]

I'm a working class southerner. The only tea I have is in a cup with milk and sugar.
On mn a lot of posts talk about their evening meal as"tea", "what shall i make for tea" etc.
Do any southeners call it tea?

I’m from the London area and I call it tea. But my mum is from Yorkshire.

South west, it’s tea.

I'm a MC lifelong southerner now living in Cumbria. I say lunch and dinner, but everyone else round here says dinner and tea. They also tend to eat their evening meal very early. My dc (who still sound totally southern) vary between saying dinner and tea for the evening meal.

I'm a teacher and they're still dinner ladies in the schools I've taught in, even the naice private ones, the horror.

Quite. My experience too. HR might advertise hem as MDS roles, but everyone knows they are dinner ladies - even the "man dinner lady" my dc had when they were at school

I also ask the children if they have packed lunch or if they are having dinners, just to confuse things
Exactly.

I'm from the north west and always said lunch and dinner. Growing up I always thought using the term 'tea' for a meal was northern working class .

Man dinner lady 😁

We had a dinner man for a while!

It's due to heavy industry being a more northern thing. You main meal was between 12-14.00, so was called dinner.

Tea would be a less substantial meal.

Lots of factories had work canteens and lots of people worked withing walking distance of home so would either come home or in my grandmother's childhood the children would take 'snap' to their dad's work place.

After work you would have a cup of tea and something like a sandwich.

Find 'back in time for tea' on replay to see what has traditionally been eaten.

Juells I'm not entirely serious you know but it does sound wrong to me

Dontcallmebaby my severely southern MC children reproached me the other day for saying fast as fah-st rather than farr-st. Mind you my language use evolved in some very strange ways when I first came to the UK, as I was in a very heavily accented bit of the south but flat-sharing with two true northerners. I have no idea what on earth people think I am rough as, probably

Scottish

Breakfast, Lunch, Tea, then supper which is a wee snack at bedtime.

Though reading this thread it has weirdly occurred to me

Dinner is exclusively

• school dinners
• going out for dinner / going to a dinner party
• sunday/christmas/other celebration dinner (eaten around 3pm)

Language is weird, isn't it

I've just had my dinner. Early this afternoon I also had dinner! Sometimes I have tea. Sometimes lunch.

I'm now half and half - grew up in the very middle class south, now live in quite a rough area but work in a professional field and I've ended up with the hybrid of "lunch and tea" which is odd but pretty fixed now. I think the reason I switched early on the 'tea' thing was that as a student you went to/had people round for tea, and even now that's more commonly talked about than the midday meal. My colleagues would often say 'lunchbreak' even tho the meal those who are born and bred Northerners eat is definitely dinner. They don't correct me saying lunch but I think people would if you said dinner for tea. Iyswim!

From Cumbria, would either say Dinner & Tea as previous posters have said or some in my family would say dinner at mid day, tea as a light late afternoon snack and supper as a later evening meal.

Now I live in Birmingham and work an office job I say Lunch and Tea

Breakfast, lunch, tea - living in London but parents from South Wales

I want to know when dinner ladies at school became lunchtime supervisors.

Not round here they’re not. They’re Welfare Assistants!

I’m having my tea right now. Jacket potato, cheese and beans with salad.

I’m going to make myself a cup of tea in a minute.

When I was little I used to have breakfast, dinner and tea and then supper before I went to bed. Usually a piece of toast or cereal.

A very posh uni friend of mine would have either “kitchen sups” - hot meal but for family / close friends served at the kitchen table or “dinner” which was a more formal hot evening meal served in the dining room!

Lunch and tea or dinner here - usually tea though.
Now live in Midlands, but family as far back as I remember born and bred in London boroughs and it's always been "tea".

We do use dinner - but it either has to be a meal outside of the home, or a cooked evening meal. Conversely tea is oniy eaten in a home setting - if we go out it's for dinner or lunch.

To those who don't use "tea" - What would you call a light evening meal? If you had a cooked meal at lunch/early afternoon, then something light in the evening. Would it be supper, or something else?

Northwest here - it’s Breakfast, dinner, tea. Supper was mentioned up thread. To me supper is a bonus meal you have before bed sometimes, such as some toast. 😳

I'm Scottish and would say breakfast then dinner then tea

Growing up (MC) in the Midlands with a northern mother, it was breakfast, lunch (if light/not a main meal; sometimes referred to as a 'snack lunch') or dinner (if hot/main meal), and tea (whether hot or cold). Supper was a snack before bed. I now live abroad and use breakfast, lunch, dinner.

Or if we eat late or something light in the evening it might be supper. We don't have the concept of supper as a snack before bed, but we eat fairly late.

And going out was different too. We went out for 'lunch', not 'dinner'. We never went out to eat in the evenings but I doubt very much it would have been called 'going out for tea'. I've seen this on here now and again and find it quite strange.

North west here
Always lunch and dinner
When I was a child we had tea as children, maybe at 5-5.30 then my parents ate later 7-8 for dinner
As we got older we joined them
Tea is now only for afternoon tea
I do remember my DF having supper though about 10pm, tea or coffee, milky drink with a piece of cake or a biscuit, home made fruit pie.
He was in a manual job and probably needed the extra calories
He also used to have 2 breakfasts and a mid morning snack! Lunch and then an afternoon snack
If anything tender towards slender but with muscle - he’s 93 this year so not done him much harm!

Tended not tender

Lunch and tea here in Yorkshire but a few people say dinner instead of lunch hence dinnerladies.

My dbro and I used to ask for supper following tea which was basically dessert .

Friend: come for tea = I will probably be the only guest and I can wear my scruffs.
Friend: come for dinner = there will be other guests, a shedload of alcohol and I need to smarten up a bit.

You can go out for tea as well, it would be a more informal meal and somewhat earlier than if you were going out for dinner.

Lunch used to be dinner when I was younger, but then it was the main meal of the day. Now it’s usually sandwiches or something light, it’s lunch (except on 25th December).

Supper is either for aristocrats or cheese and crackers.

I sometimes meet a friend from another part of the country for a meal - the text instructions have to be very precise - “can you meet for dinner?” “Do you mean dinner dinner or lunch dinner?”