Dinner in the 1950s

[Clitheroekid]

I enjoyed reading this feature about food in the 1950s and 1960s - https://www.historic-uk.com/CultureUK/F ... 50s-1960s/

However, I was confused by the `Suggested Menus' illustration. What did they mean by `dinner’? If they’re referring to what we would now call lunch it seems totally OTT. Admittedly, I was only a small child in the 50s, but even so I can’t recall people eating anything like that quantity of food at lunchtime.

But if they mean dinner as in an evening meal why is there no mention of what people were supposed to eat between breakfast and dinner?

And if it was indeed an evening meal what’s with the `supper’ afterwards? Again, I don’t recall people eating `potato soup and a Cornish pasty’ or gobbling down a plate of soused herrings before heading off to bed.

All very confusing. Or am I just mis-remembering? I'm aware that some regulars are even older than me, so I'd be interested to hear your memories of your daily eating habits during that time.

[Dod101]

I enjoyed reading this feature about food in the 1950s and 1960s - https://www.historic-uk.com/CultureUK/F ... 50s-1960s/

However, I was confused by the `Suggested Menus' illustration. What did they mean by `dinner’? If they’re referring to what we would now call lunch it seems totally OTT. Admittedly, I was only a small child in the 50s, but even so I can’t recall people eating anything like that quantity of food at lunchtime.

But if they mean dinner as in an evening meal why is there no mention of what people were supposed to eat between breakfast and dinner?

And if it was indeed an evening meal what’s with the `supper’ afterwards? Again, I don’t recall people eating `potato soup and a Cornish pasty’ or gobbling down a plate of soused herrings before heading off to bed.

All very confusing. Or am I just mis-remembering? I'm aware that some regulars are even older than me, so I'd be interested to hear your memories of your daily eating habits during that time.

I suspect that by dinner they mean what we would now call lunch. Certainly in Scotland just after the War, lunch time was the main meal, usually referred to as dinner, taken around 12 noon. Around 5 pm we had High Tea which was a main cooked dish followed by bread and butter and often some sweet cakes, often home baked, with tea. Supper might be something light around 10 pm just before bed.

Dod

[bluedonkey]

Yes, I remember in the 1970s supper being a sandwich and a cup of tea around 10pm. Coincided with the News At Ten, of course.

[XFool]

I enjoyed reading this feature about food in the 1950s and 1960s - https://www.historic-uk.com/CultureUK/F ... 50s-1960s/

What about the cider and sardines on Sunday?

However, I was confused by the `Suggested Menus' illustration. What did they mean by `dinner’? If they’re referring to what we would now call lunch it seems totally OTT. Admittedly, I was only a small child in the 50s, but even so I can’t recall people eating anything like that quantity of food at lunchtime.

"dinner" was, of course "lunch" - if you must. Think "dinner time" at school. Or don't they have that anymore?

[Mike88]

As a child in the 1950's always I had my dinner at a time we now call lunchtime. Children stayed in school for their school dinners. In the 1950's only posh people had their dinner in the evening. My wife, who was a schoolteacher, informs me that kids and the school itself call the midday meal "dinner".

[Lootman]

I suspect that by dinner they mean what we would now call lunch.

Yes, I recall as a kid my father would ride his bike home from work at (what we now call lunchtime) and the family would have "dinner", the main meal of the day. Then he would ride his bike back to work.

Around 6 p.m. we would then have "tea" or "supper", which was a light meal (salad, sandwich, soup).

And of course at school at noon we would have "dinner", served by fearsome "dinner ladies".

[Urbandreamer]

I post date the 50's, but do feel that it may be appropriate to point out that we still had rationing of food in the 50's.

Regardless of if the mid-day meal is called lunch or dinner and if tea is a meal between 11'ses and dinner at 8, there may have been a reason to eat less meals.

[Alaric]

However, I was confused by the `Suggested Menus' illustration. What did they mean by `dinner’? If they’re referring to what we would now call lunch it seems totally OTT. Admittedly, I was only a small child in the 50s, but even so I can’t recall people eating anything like that quantity of food at lunchtime. .

I think from the context they mean a midday meal. But with children at school and one or both parents at work, home cooked midday meals would be less frequent. Many workplaces offered canteens, so substantial lunches were plausible. For that matter, there's the school dinner, served between morning and afternoon lessons.

Having a main meal in the evening wasn't unknown, for example if out and about on holiday, it might just be a "packed" lunch at midday.

[XFool]

I enjoyed reading this feature about food in the 1950s and 1960s - https://www.historic-uk.com/CultureUK/F ... 50s-1960s/

What about the cider and sardines on Sunday?

Of course, I should have added: "Provided you could find a key and if the damn lug didn't snap off."

"Appalling! Every damn time." As our new king might have put it...

[Newroad]

Hi All.

My Scottish Nana would have said "dinner" (midday meal) and "tea" (early evening meal) - we never had anything known as "supper" (though coffee and a biscuit mid-evening was fairly normal). Relating to tea, when I was away (awa' ?) playing with a mate, she said stuff like "Be home the back of five". I didn't understand that phrase when I was a kid, probably not until well after she died (when I would have looked it up somewhere, probably Google) but I knew when dinner was (around 5.30pm) so it never caused an issue in practise!

Whether lunch or dinner and then dinner or tea is a function of geography and to a lesser/correlated sense, perceived class. The further north you are in the UK (or the south you are in North America) the more likely you are to use dinner to refer to the midday meal. The more middle/upper class you purport to be biases the base geographic probability towards dinner being the evening meal. I understand that both of the above factors and any prevalence towards dinner being the midday meal reflects the relative historic disposition towards manual labour, whether in a local factory (more likely in the UK) or agricultural (more likely in the southern US). In Australia, class and geography have had relatively less importance and I would judge age the greatest determiner of use - older people relatively more likely to use "dinner" for the midday meal, younger people "lunch".

If you go further back to the etymology itself, "dinner" is close to "breakfast" in meaning, i.e. literally the first meal of the day. Apparently, for the Romans in particular, the midday meal was typically the first of the day. It made its way into English from Latin via French.

Regards, Newroad

[Alaric]

Whether lunch or dinner and then dinner or tea is a function of geography and to a lesser/correlated sense, perceived class.

State schools usually referred to the midday meal as "dinner" as in "dinner lady" or "dinner money". What though of fee paying schools, in particular resdential ones, otherwise termed "Public Schools"?

[scotia]

. Certainly in Scotland just after the War, lunch time was the main meal,
Dod

Perhaps in rural areas, but in industrial areas the father returned from work, and the children arrived home from school around 4pm, and the mother had the main meal of the day ready soon after. A main meal at noon was impractical down a coal mine!

[Dod101]

However, I was confused by the `Suggested Menus' illustration. What did they mean by `dinner’? If they’re referring to what we would now call lunch it seems totally OTT. Admittedly, I was only a small child in the 50s, but even so I can’t recall people eating anything like that quantity of food at lunchtime. .

I think from the context they mean a midday meal. But with children at school and one or both parents at work, home cooked midday meals would be less frequent. Many workplaces offered canteens, so substantial lunches were plausible. For that matter, there's the school dinner, served between morning and afternoon lessons.

Having a main meal in the evening wasn't unknown, for example if out and about on holiday, it might just be a "packed" lunch at midday.

I am thinking of the early to mid 1950s. Most wives did not work then and so were ready and able to cook a substantial midday meal for the man of the house returning home briefly from work just as Lootman describes. Substantial lunches (dinners) were not just plausible, that is what happened in respectable workingclass households anyway.

Dod

[scotia]

I am thinking of the early to mid 1950s. Most wives did not work then and so were ready and able to cook a substantial midday meal for the man of the house returning home briefly from work just as Lootman describes. Substantial lunches (dinners) were not just plausible, that is what happened in respectable workingclass households anyway.

Dod

You seem to have led a sheltered life. In lots of respectable working class households, the main wage earner could/did not return home at mid day for a meal. I have quoted my family experience in a mining village - but it extended to other industries. Not to mention the problems of shift working.

[Dod101]

I am thinking of the early to mid 1950s. Most wives did not work then and so were ready and able to cook a substantial midday meal for the man of the house returning home briefly from work just as Lootman describes. Substantial lunches (dinners) were not just plausible, that is what happened in respectable workingclass households anyway.

Dod

You seem to have led a sheltered life. In lots of respectable working class households, the main wage earner could/did not return home at mid day for a meal. I have quoted my family experience in a mining village - but it extended to other industries. Not to mention the problems of shift working.

I have no idea but if so, so did Lootman apparently. In my family history notes, I have commented that the industrial revolution more or less passed us by and that is true on all sides of my family so maybe you are right. We lived in a relatively small town and my father worked within walking or cycling distance of our house as a joiner in the workshop. He returned after 12 noon and was back at work by 1 pm. He thus had plenty of time for the main meal of the day at home during that time. My mother did not work and so she had the meal dished up for him more or less as he came in the door. We and those in a similar position called that meal dinner. Tea was usually not later than 5.30 pm after my father returned home. He often worked overtime but came home for tea and might then return to work for a further three hours or so. His normal working hours were 8 am to 5 pm with an hour off between 12 noon and 1 pm. That was in the immediate postwar period although my memory is probably of the early 1950s.

Dod

[Rhyd6]

In the 1950s we had our main meal of the day at about 6.00pm when my father arrived home from work. I started school full time aged 3 and I have a certificate stating that I attended every school day for a year. I tried school dinners but they didn't go down well, I'd been brought up in a house full of adults, Mum & Dad, Grandma and my mother's brother, when the dinner ladies put a plate of food in front of me they gave me a spoon to eat it. I remember sticking my hand in the air and asking politely for a knife and fork and a napkin. I was mocked merciliessly by said dinner ladies and when I got home told Mum that I was never going to have school dinners again and I didn't. I always took sandwiches and an apple from then on.
The menu looks somewhat weird. Where are the shepherd's pies, stews, rissoles, potatoe cakes with fritters? I could go on and on. We lived on a farm and we always had a hidden pig, it took me a while to relise that when George ( they were always called George) went on his holidays he wasn't coming back.
One of my cousins has just written and published his autobiography and in it he mentions the delights of coming to stay with us and being allowed to have "seconds", especially my mum's mousse which was made using Carnation milk whipped into an almost set jelly which still gets the grandchildren and great grandchildren excited.
Happy days.

R6

[88V8]

In 1950s/60 Norf London, the school lunch was referred to by all as 'school dinner'.

At home, it was lunch, then dinner was referred to as tea.

I don't honestly recall what we ate for lunch, but dinner was salad plus something in summer, then in winter stew, stuffed marrow, mince, roast, gammon & pineapple, a favourite was spaghetti bolognese which I guess was quite a big deal in the 50s, smoked cod, plaice, bangers & mash, shepherd's pie, and occasionally steak which vanished in a puff of indignation when fillet reached 7/6d @lb.

V8

[pje16]

occasionally steak which vanished in a puff of indignation when fillet reached 7/6d @lb.

For the Yoof
7/6d is 37.5 p

[redsturgeon]

In my 60's childhood my father worked at a large factory about a mile from our house. He cycled home for "dinner" at noon and a loud siren sounded at 12.55 to summon the workers back for the afternoon.

John

[Dod101]

In my 60's childhood my father worked at a large factory about a mile from our house. He cycled home for "dinner" at noon and a loud siren sounded at 12.55 to summon the workers back for the afternoon.

John

Pretty much my father as well, except 10 years earlier.

Dod