SPRING SESSION: Meals

Britains have mostly breakfast, lunch, dinner and supper. It is a little different then we have because we eat three times a day. For breakfast they usually have a cup of tea or coffee, rolls and butter. But others like porridge or cornflakes with milk or cream and sugar, bacon and eggs. Their breakfast is at the same time as us is.

They have lunch about 1.00 p.m. (we have dinner at that time). It is almost impossible for Englishman to come home for lunch.  They make it at home and take with themselves. It can be  cold meat, potatoes, salad and pickles, with a pudding or fruit to follow. Sometimes Englishman has a mutton chop, or steak and chips, followed by biscuits and cheese, and some people like a glass of light beer with lunch.

   Afternoon tea you can hardly call a meal, but it is a sociable sort of thing, as friends often come in then for a chat while they have their cup of tea, cake or biscuit.

Tea making in England is an art. The hostess first of all rinses the teapot with boiling water (this is called 'warming the pot') before adding four or five teaspoonfuls of tea. The amount of tea varies, of course, according to the number of people present. The pot is then filled with boiling water and covered by a tea-cosy to allow the tea to infuse for five minutes. English people seldom put lemon juice or rum in their tea, usually they have it with milk.

A typical British meal for dinner is "meat and two veg". They put hot brown gravy, (traditionally made from the juices of the roast meat, but more often today from a packet!) on the meat and usually the vegetables. One of the vegetables is almost always potatoes.

Sunday lunch time is a typical time to eat the traditional Sunday Roast. Traditionally it consists of roast meat, (cooked in the oven for about two hours), two different kinds of vegetables and potatoes with a Yorkshire pudding. The most common joints are beef, lamb or pork; chicken is also popular.