This is an All Ears English podcast episode 2074.
Dinner or supper?
What's the difference?
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When it comes to the evening meal, do you say dinner or supper?
Today we answer a great question from a listener about the difference between these two words in American English.
Listen in and find out why this is linked to US history and what might happen with the term supper in the future.
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Hey there, Michelle.
How are you doing today?
Hey, Lindsay.
I'm good.
How are you?
Hey, it's good to be on the microphone.
It's a sunny day in Denver, so all good.
No complaints.
No complaints.
Good.
Good lindsay, what did you have for supper last night?
Supper, what a strange word to me.
I almost never used that word.
But i can tell you what i had was a bowl of salad.
I eat a lot of salad like 10 salads a week, just kale and i put sweet potatoes on it, some cheese, some almonds and walnuts, so i go all out with my salads.
That sounds, what about you?
Really good.
I had some pasta and I don't know why, but lately I've been having a plum with like every single meal.
Plums are good.
Do you like peaches better or plums?
I like both.
I have both.
It's like such a good summery, juicy fruit, like both of them and nectarines.
I love.
Yeah, it's fun to eat like around the season, right?
So this past weekend we were up in Breckenridge doing some biking and just taking some time with my extended family.
And my sister-in-law's family was in charge of cooking.
And they made like an everything peach meal.
Like they made a peach kind of bourbon drink.
And then they made a peach kind of a mix or glaze for the meat and then a peach cobbler they had at the end.
Oh my gosh, that sounds amazing.
That I would have been, oh, that would have been great.
We didn't get to try the peach cobbler, unfortunately, but yes.
Yeah, I know, right?
So it's fun to cook with a theme, a certain theme.
Yeah, that is fun.
That is fun.
So you said that that sounded strange to you when I said, what did you have for supper last night?
Very strange.
Yes, because I never say that. never say it either so but we're that's what we're talking about today we because we have a listener question so this is going to be a really really fun one but guys also we want to let you know that stay and listen to this episode guys especially on spotify because on spotify there is a special poll that we are going to have at the end of the episode and guys you can participate in this poll and a future episode we will share the results so this is a great new way to interact with us interact with uh your fellow listeners so just listen on for that yeah so keep listening guys to the very end so is today's are there any related episodes our listeners should go back and listen to to get some back well that's such a recent episode of yeah but uh we have episode 2065 was uh why are Americans all about aliens?
So not so much related, but this is, I just had to.
I just thought this one aliens, you know supper and aliens do.
Aliens eat supper or dinner?
I don't know.
Um, but go ahead and listen to that one.
So anyway, this is a question from Fabiana Lindsay.
Um, would you like to read the question?
I would love to, here we go.
Hi Lindsay.
I was doing a duolingo exercise and I saw the word supper replacing the word dinner.
So I Googled these two words and one of the outcomes was Merriam-Webster establishes dinner as the principal meal of the day.
Supper, on the other hand, has three definitions.
Whoa, I didn't know.
The evening meal.
When dinner is taken at midday, a light meal served late in the evening and an evening social, especially for raising funds.
I also found that dinner and supper depend on the US region.
However, what really confused me was the chunk of the definition which says when dinner is taken at midday.
Oh my gosh, this is really odd to me.
I thought that midday around noon would always be lunch.
Anyway, am I wrong if I keep using the word dinner for the evening meal?
Is there any particular situation which I really need to use the word supper instead of dinner?
Thank you for your help, Fabiana.
Oh my gosh, what a question.
Fabiana i?
I, when i was reading what you put from google, i was just as confused.
Because what, what?
Oh, it's lunch and breakfast.
Is dinner and dessert, like no?
Um, that's very confusing, and so i was excited about this question because i have a lot to learn about this as well.
Um so yeah lindsay, i never say supper.
Sounds like you don't say supper either, right?
No, i really don't, but i know like over my lifetime, i have known people who do say supper let's just say that right, like people's parents when i was a kid, or people in different parts of the country.
So it is a word in the english language, of course, that we do use.
So today we're gonna find out the difference, right?
Exactly yeah, to me it sounds old-fashioned, like maybe in a book um and, like you said, i do know people who have who say supper, And it does kind of make my ears perk up because I'm so used to hearing dinner.
So, yeah, there was this Daily Meal article, thedailymeal.com.
And this article is called This is Why Your Grandparents Call Dinner Supper.
This is by Taylor Rock back May 20th, 2019.
So I am going to read a little chunk of the article because I think this is helpful.
So it says.
But midday dinner is and evening supper were the most prevalent terms in agricultural communities during the 18th and 19th centuries.
Farmers would fill up on dinner around noon to carry them through work.
But then it all started to change when people began working away from the farm and weren't able to return home to eat in the middle of the day.
So that's something from a food historian, Helen Zoe Veit on NPR.
And it says supper became dinner because evenings become the only time working class families were able to gather for a meal.
Wow.
It's fascinating Michelle, especially the fact that so much of our history has revolved around farming.
Right.
Right.
Right.
So like this is like it's just so interesting.
Even that was it's like a little bit confusing.
So it's just kind of how the workday changed and what people's jobs were.
I didn't know any of this.
So like when they say dinner is taken mid day like this is from our listener it must mean when the large meal is in the middle of the day.
Yeah.
So I guess, like if we want kind of a technical definition, would you say that that is our definition?
Then the larger meal where people gather is more of a dinner whether that's but.
But today we really mostly just call the evening meal dinner, whether we're gathering or snacking, don't we?
Uh like well if, if it's a light dinner yeah yeah, we have a light dinner, we have.
But like, i think it's just that, as far as you know, our listener question, i think um, this is confused.
This is confusing yeah, and this does come from, like you know, this is this.
These words have history to them and like how this kind of changed and how everything um, you know, was changing in, you know, 18th and 19th centuries.
So yeah, it's saying farmers, these farmers had dinner at noon.
Yep.
But then, yeah, it did change.
So they couldn't eat in the middle of the day.
And so then the supper became dinner.
So I don't know.
Yeah.
I mean, I think the most important thing for Fabiana to know, right if she's living in the US, is
Don't worry about the word supper.
Just don't use it.
Dinner.
We use dinner for evening meal.
And then in my mind, the only time I use dinner I might say Easter dinner which might happen between it could happen at like 1 pm, 2 pm, 3 pm, 4 pm.
That's true.
Christmas dinner could happen earlier.
Thanksgiving dinner could happen earlier.
It's always so weird to me.
Like, do you I mean, yeah.
Do you sometimes like does your family gather for Thanksgiving dinner at like 3 p.m.?
?
Yeah, like we've done 4 p.m. is the earliest I think we've done.
Why do we do that?
That's such a late because we because, you know, my family does that, too.
It's always sometimes random holidays or early dinner.
Yeah, I don't I think it's just everyone's around the house all day.
It's probably about football.
Yeah, i'm in a big football family these days my in-laws are big into football, so i think that might have, and we're all just gathering around smelling the cooking all day and it's really, i think, at thanksgiving in my world.
It's about when the turkey's ready, and if you put the turkey in at 8 am, it's usually ready around three or four, i i guess.
Oh michelle well okay, but the main thing is again for the.
I think don't think about supper.
Lunch is lunch, dinner is dinner.
Don't let this confuse you like, don't you know now?
Lunch is dinner, dinner is lunch, breakfast is a midnight snack, i don't know um the supper is.
I mean, perhaps in certain parts of the country people say it more but um, i just don't think it's that common and it and it was interesting to me that this is that the article was called.
This is why your grandparents call dinner supper.
Lindsay, you said you know people who say supper.
Do you notice it with a certain age?
Yeah, i think it is an older thing which would make sense based on the quote we just read right.
So people that maybe did grow up when there was more farming going on and built their days around this, or their parents did right, they would still use supper.
So when you hear someone say come over for supper, It's really come over for dinner.
And the person who says that might be talking about an earlier dinner.
If they are a little older, they might be eating earlier, right?
Who knows?
Who knows?
Yeah.
The person I know who consistently says supper is on the older end.
So, you know, I don't know anybody around, you know, in my age range that says supper.
So, yeah, but it is true.
If somebody says like but I know what it means.
You know I've had.
I've had this person say, oh and, and what was?
What did you have for supper?
I know what it means, you know what it means.
So if somebody's asking you about supper, just take it to mean dinner.
I think yeah, that's our advice for Fabiana and anyone else living in the States.
Understand what supper means.
It means dinner.
You don't have to use it though, because it is probably going to be gone.
I would say is probably going to be gone in another 25 years.
That word yeah yeah, Interesting.
I would say so.
I would say so, too.
This is a great question, though.
It really is.
Now, really, it's just breakfast, brunch, lunch, dinner, dessert, snack.
I would say that those are the basic ones.
Yeah, I love that.
I love that.
Okay Michelle, before we get into our questions, I'm not sure if this is on our list of questions to ask each other here in this episode.
I have a very important question on your opinion on something.
Okay.
What are your thoughts on breakfast for dinner?
Breakfast for dinner.
Love it.
Love it.
Okay, good.
We're on the same page then.
Yeah, breakfast for dinner.
So I wonder when that started or if that just always existed.
Probably in the 90s.
Probably in the 90s.
The 90s were a time of you know change making and you know breaking up the norms, i think.
And so yeah, what we mean by breakfast for dinner at home?
When i was a kid, we used to do this, maybe every month, once a month we do like pancakes for dinner, or waffles for dinner, cereal for dinner, and you love it.
Whether you're an adult or a kid, you usually love it.
Yes exactly, i do so.
I like i.
I do like doing that from time to time.
I don't know what it is.
It just feels kind of special feels kind of like a sleepover.
I don't know why.
I think it's because so I remember when I used to sleep over at my grandparents when I was a little girl.
I remember every night, like at nighttime, my grandpa, my grandpa would give me pancakes.
Oh, that's maybe it like gives me that nice feeling of like my grandparents. yeah there's something special about it it's kind of breaking the rules doing something fun and different um yeah what's your favorite meal of the day by the way and then we'll finish up today's episode i think my favorite meal of of the day i think i'm a lunch person what about you interesting breakfast for sure i love breakfast food i love egg and cheese sandwiches they're harder to find out here but i love them especially on the east coast oh my gosh good yeah yeah uh no that that is good uh i do love breakfast as well but um now i would say i would say like i like a well i like a good lunch but what a just real fast what about you dessert do you eat dessert every day or great question michelle um no i don't i wish i i wish i did i wish i did and i probably could right i'm an active person but i just don't yeah i think it's easy to get into habits.
And for my personal diet, like that would be, that might be a little dangerous.
Yeah.
Yeah.
What about you, Michelle?
Um no, not every day, but um yeah, recently I I had a lot of ice cream and I thought of you every day.
Like, I feel like I'm falling in love with ice cream all over again.
Have you had that?
Yes.
Have you had um?
Do you see like the newest thing is to have, like the cookie monster, ice cream flavor?
No, I have not seen it.
It's blue.
I think they say it's like really just like vanilla, but they have like all these cookies and it is so good. um so if you see that give it a try I will check it out I will check it out I know in the summer you get into stints right ice cream super common and just living life right like on the weekends I end up doing dessert more often because I'm over at a friend's house and there's drinks and dessert and then you're at someone's dinner but like on a normal week to week basis yeah not so maybe once a week right at home right that kind of thing right right right right right right yeah yeah so i wonder what our listeners do in terms of their diet and dessert yes yeah guys we told you there was going to be a poll if you're listening on spotify today you will see a poll okay so the question is do you eat dessert every day and just answer yes or no.
And so we want to hear like, what are your dessert habits?
So we will share once we get a bunch of those results, we will share them on a future episode.
So I'm curious to hear.
Yes, we're excited.
Guys, go over right now, participate in that poll.
And again, like Michelle said, we will announce the results of the poll.
So we'll know our community, our community's habits, what we do, what we eat, by the time we bring this poll up again.
All right.
Good stuff, Michelle.
Any final takeaway for our listeners?
Loved the question.
This was really fun.
And I think it's always fun to explore how language can evolve over time, based on societal changes, and how certain things came to be.
So that was a fun one to plan to research.
So thanks for that question, guys.
Let's use dinner.
Try not to think about supper.
Yeah, don't worry about it too much.
Thanks to Fabiana for asking the question.
Guys, we love your questions.
Send them in to lindsay at allersenglish.com.
All right, Michelle.
Thanks for hanging out today.
I'll talk to you soon.
All right.
Bye, guys.
Bye.
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