To think that you’re evening meal is called ‘tea’ not ‘dinner’?!

[Biscoffaddict]

I see so many posters on here referring to their evening mea, as ‘dinner’, but in real life I’ve never met anyone who does this and it’s always ‘tea’. It always has been tea. My parents call it tea, my grandparents called it tea, my friends call it tea, my work colleagues call it tea etc. ‘Dinner’ is the meal you have in the middle of the day and that’s why school dinner ladies, are called dinner ladies!

I don’t know but I find it quite irrationally annoying! Surely I’m not alone?!

Your thinking is quite narrow, OP.

I grew up with dinner and tea (suburban south of England and then Derbyshire, working class) but now say lunch and dinner because these days I live in that London and masquerade one of those metropolitan elites.

I can understand that people call it different things for these and other reasons. Try it. It's not hard.

On the vexed issue of bread rolls, in Derbyshire it's a cob.

You need to get out and see more of the UK when this is allowed, OP. Don't you realise the UK is a fabulous mixture of classes, culture and social norms? Or did you think everyone is like you?

BRUNCH!

(Breakfast, lunch and dinner. Tea, a drink with jam and bread.)

Jaxhog
Mind you, in times gone by, breakfast was your midday meal.

Never encountered that. So what would they call the (fairly substantial) meal farmers and labourers had when they came in after morning milking at about 7:30-8:30ish?

Even in the middle ages a meal before the middle of the day existed for children, the elderly, the infirm, and anyone who laboured in the fields. What was it called if they broke their fast before the midday meal?

What on earth is wrong with you!!

You have a skewed idea of what 'dramatic' means if you rate those comments as such.

You, however, are being dramatic about them!

Tea for northerners. Everyone knows what lunch means so imo the word dinner should just be scrapped, it's too controversial...

@OxfordCat

Oh ffs. Have you never left Wales OP? Is your only other point of reference Coronation Street? . If you go to a restaurant do you ask to book a table for "tea"?!

Actually yes. People around here saying ‘going out for tea’ or ‘going out for a meal’.

My parents called it dinner, my grandparents called it dinner, my friends call it dinner, my work colleagues call it dinner etc. ‘Lunch’ is the meal you have in the middle of the day. Tea is the hot liquid you drink.

I was born and bred in the south east so I know this is the norm for that part of the UK. I also know that it is not the norm for other parts of the UK and that dinner is at midday and tea is the evening meal for a large part of the UK and you know what Op, it really doesn't bother me at all. Probably because I don't having a fecking big chip on my shoulder - HTH.

Supper. Evening meal is supper.

Depends on the time of day - breakfast, lunch, tea, dinner, supper ... Tea was mid-afternoon, dinner was 8ish and supper was after the theatre or whatever ( l read too much )
Call it what you like though, who cares?

The Tea as a meal is utterly baffling to foreigners. "Tea is what you eat in the evening. But no! It is a hot drink?!"

I cannot bear the word 'supper'

If I hear anyone say it, a little bit of me dies inside.

@MagicSummer

How can you get to adulthood without knowing this is a class thing?

Haven’t you even met MC people? Or in your head are they just “annoying people”?

Haven’t you noticed other class signifiers? Or have you also dismiss d all of those as people “doing it wrong”?

Maybe you should try to travel a bit or go to uni or just move towns once or twice to broaden your experience.

Nothing wrong with being WC, but it’s worrying to be so tunnel visioned about it.

Why is a Sunday lunch called a roast dinner?

Or to put it another way, why is a roast dinner called a Sunday lunch?

Honestly, you have to be very insular, pig-headed or frankly a bit dim to insist that one way is right and the other wrong. It's funny how it's somehow fine to say 'only posh people call it dinner', but I expect if someone said 'only common/working-class people call it tea' they'd be absolutely flamed.

I think that people from Essex sometimes say Tea as well, it's just a North/South thing

To think that you’re evening meal is called ‘tea’ not ‘dinner’?!

OP, it's 'your evening meal', not 'you're evening meal'. If you're going to mock our vernacular, don't make mistakes.

If it helps you decide: in prison, the evening meal is often called "tea".

The Tea as a meal is utterly baffling to foreigners. "Tea is what you eat in the evening. But no! It is a hot drink?!"

It's quite normal in all languages for words to have multiple meanings, and for the usage of certain words to vary from region to region.

Breakfast, brunch, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner then supper.

If you go to a restaurant menus are lunch/dinner etc.

Lunch ladies at school.

I’m in the West of Scotland and this is the norm in our area.

I’m in the supper camp. I’m not sure why it’s an emotive subject though. Some people say tea, or dinner or supper. Does it matter?

Wow, yet another Mumsnetter ignorant enough to think the world turns around their experiences.

I live in Wales and I say breakfast, lunch and dinner. I would say going out for dinner. Tea is a drink. Informal would be supper, which I prefer.

@SittinOnTheDockOfTheBay

My grandmother did 😂

I’m not sure why it’s an emotive subject though.

Because people relate it to class, and conversations about class are often emotive.