[Sca-cooks] Cooking period foods resembling modern foods

[Terry Decker]

>Let us examine your contention that food was eaten first thing in the
>morning. None of the scholarly literature that I have read, including the
>works of Terence Scully and Bridget Henisch, suggest that any meal (as
>opposed to snack) was regularly eaten before 10 am. In fact, workers
>generally came home for MID-DAY 'dinner', just as they did the later
>agrarian societies later on (see 18th and 19th c. historical works for
>later info). Supper is the later meal, Dinner is generally when you break
>your fast.
>
>
>-- Pani Jadwiga Zajaczkowa, Knowledge Pika jenne at fiedlerfamily.net

Some questions come to mind.

What precisely is a meal in the Medieval/Renaissance context?  (For that
matter, what is a snack in the same context?)

When and to what extent was food eaten outside of meals?

How and when did two meals become three?

The derivation of the word "lunch(eon)" appears to be from "nuncheon"
meaning "light snack" derived from the Middle English "nonschench" meaning
"noon drink."  The definition is liquid refreshment or a light snack taken
between meals.  The earliest noted use of the ME word is 1353.  Obviously,
lunch originally meant a noon break for refreshment; so, when does lunch
first include food?  When does lunch become the mid-day meal?

Bear