7

A late breakfast/early lunch combination meal is called "brunch". Is there a parallel term for the afternoon?

What do I call "lunch" joined with "dinner"?

Note that I don't mean a meal eaten between lunch and dinner, but a meal that serves the purpose of both lunch and dinner.

Improve this question
10
  • When speaking with a friend of mine, I was used to say lunner, a word I coined basing on brunch; sometimes I use blunner. ;)
    – avpaderno
    Commented Apr 26, 2013 at 13:02
  • @WendiKidd Please not change question to something else. How to call in English "launch" + "dinner" eat late? is not Phrase for a meal between lunch and dinner. It is illogical the last meal can not be meal between lunch and dinner - is not it?
    – Chameleon
    Commented May 3, 2013 at 16:55
  • @Chameleon, you'll need to add some more detail... to me the edit made perfect sense. You're looking for the name of a meal that you eat after the normal lunch time but before the normal dinner time?
    – Hellion
    Commented May 3, 2013 at 17:17
  • 1
    @Hellion BTW Polish eats such meals breakfast (first breakfast), second breakfast (optional and lite), dinner (large - 2 dishes first soup, second not soup + salad - some times 3rd dish desert + tea, coffee), before supper (original name - optional and lite), supper. We not have launch and eat dinner later than launch :) Polish meals is different than English - supper is lite and dinner is heavy in Poland - launch is very small and dine/supper very large and late in England. It is significant difference.
    – Chameleon
    Commented May 3, 2013 at 17:33
  • 1
    Second breakfast? Sounds like those of us with hobbit tendencies ought to move to Poland. :) (Though of course I think what you're talking about are merely the equivalents of the Hungarian tízórai "snack eaten at 10 a.m." and uzsonna "afternoon snack".) Also, careful of the word "dinner": in my neck of the woods, it means exactly the same thing as "supper". The meal we eat at or around noon is only ever "lunch".
    – Martha
    Commented May 3, 2013 at 20:01

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
13

Words for meals in English are:

breakfast: first meal of the day, eaten in the morning

lunch: a meal eaten around noon

supper: a meal eaten in the evening

dinner: the biggest meal of the day. For most Americans that's the same as supper, though some people have their big meal at lunch time and so call that dinner.

brunch: a meal too late to normally be called breakfast and too early to be lunch, and/or which takes the place of breakfast and lunch.

There is no commonly-used word for a late lunch or early dinner or supper. Dinner times vary pretty widely. A big meal eaten anywhere between about 5:00 pm and 10:00 pm would routinely be called supper or dinner and no one would consider that strange. People sometimes say "we had an early dinner" or "we eat supper late" to distinguish.

Improve this answer
4
  • Americans often eat Sunday dinner in the afternoon, as well as on Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter. English generally have breakfast, dinner and "tea" in my experience. I lived there when "school dinners" went up a "whole tanner" to 1/6, so it was rather a long time ago. I suspect the mashed potatoes in said dinners haven't changed much in 40 years, however.
    – BobRodes
    Commented Jul 26, 2014 at 22:40
  • To expand a bit on BobRodes'comment - particularly in Northern England, it can also be: breakfast in the morning; dinner - large meal at midday; and tea - lighter meal around 5 or 6; then supper - snack before bed such as a couple of biscuits and a mug of Ovaltine. The usage and meaning of 'lunch', 'dinner' and 'supper' carries a significant weight of class and regional identification to a BrEng ear
    – peterG
    Commented Oct 12, 2014 at 2:20
  • I should have clarified that I was giving American usage. Yes, the British also have "tea", I have no idea what Australians call their meals, etc. @BobRodes Yes, while most Americans have their big meal in the evening, on special occasions like Christmas and Thanksgiving we typically have a big meal in the middle of the day, and thus call that "Christmas dinner" or "Thanksgiving dinner".
    – Jay
    Commented Oct 14, 2014 at 14:19
  • In our family we did that on Christmas, Thanksgiving, and Easter. When I was growing up there were a few kids whose families had Sunday dinner in the afternoon. This was a very prevalent tradition among Catholics until the second half of the 20th century, when the rules for fasting before Mass were changed. Up until then, fasting was required from the time you got up until the time you received Communion at Mass. So, the 12:15 Mass didn't exist, and people usually had a big meal right afterwards.
    – BobRodes
    Commented Oct 15, 2014 at 13:22
2

I have been hearing the term "linner" a lot around me lately (Boston, USA) to mean "lunch" joined with "dinner".

Example :

I didn't eat breakfast until about 11.30 because I've started getting up a bit later. So mid-afternoon lunch is the last time I'll eat before my 8.20 show, and technically counts as dinner as well. Call it linner or dunch. It's usually a quick sandwich.

Alternatives: luner, lunner and lupper.

Note that the word dunch has a different meaning:

A small meal between lunch and dinner in the late afternoon or early evening (about 3-5 p.m.), usually including tea or coffee with cookies, sometimes fruits, a salad or a light sandwich.

"For tomorrow, I have already scheduled lunch and dinner with my colleagues. Let's have a dunch together."

I believe that none of those words are in any official dictionary though, only proposed:

Improve this answer
4
  • If anyone said that to me I'd respond with, "Dunch, ha ha, good one. Ok 'dunch' it is."
    – Jim
    Commented Jul 26, 2014 at 19:22
  • Unfortunately I am not native enough to make fun of people speaking English :)
    – Franck Dernoncourt
    Commented Jul 26, 2014 at 19:23
  • 1
    IMO, brunch is the only combination in regular usage. All the others are "Wortspielen" based on logical cognates of the word brunch.
    – BobRodes
    Commented Jul 26, 2014 at 22:37
  • "none of those words are in any official dictionary though" Nor are they in common use, to the best of my knowledge. I've heard people say "linner", but mostly as a joke. Of course they might catch on in time, but they're not there yet.
    – Jay
    Commented Apr 27, 2020 at 15:27

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .