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"dinner" vs "supper"

my parents are from the east coast and I grew up hearing "supper's ready!". I was raised in the midwest and invited to friends houses "for dinner". As I've moved further west in my life, I hear "supper" less and less, even though I use the words interchangeably.

Which do you use? Is it a regional thing? Can i use them interchangably, or do they actually mean different things?

btw, i also say "soda" instead of "pop".

66 Comments:

I always thought it was a regional thing.

I'm from NJ and say dinner and soda.

I do think it's a regional thing. I live in Brooklyn as a grown-up. But when I was a child, we lived in my father's home town of Glace Bay, Nova Scotia. We called "dinner" what is meant now by lunch (the noontime meal); and we called supper, what we now meanl dinner. And we called soda, "pop."

This will give you an idea of how lazy I am - I have never once stopped to figure out if I am a "supper" or a "dinner" person at heart - I totally interchange them and I have not dissected why I do this. As long as there is food on the table, I answer to and use both terms!

@VerasTastyFreeze - Canadians don't use the term, "soda" that I know of, we use "pop" - I always thought it amusing that Dave Letterman used to call them, "beverages" on his TV show

Texas folk used to call the midday meal dinner and the evening meal supper. More modern or urban Texans now do lunch and dinner, but I will still always call Sunday nights meal "supper". My grandmothers used to cook big "dinners" and the leftovers served as supper too. Might as well cook enough once to feed for two meals. Mondays were laundry days so they usually had big pots of beans which didnt need tending. They also didnt refrigerate much; just threw a clean dishtowel over the leftovers and consumed them without fear a few hours later. We also called anything carbonated "Co Cola".

OK, English as a second language classes taught us "supper" is something more casual than "dinner".

@SavtaShayna - now that I think about it, that is exactly what our practice was - we originated in Newfoundland and lunchtime was "dinner" and evening meal was "supper." Then we moved to Ontario and the lines blurred. And, @ocarol, we still call the big Sunday family meal, "supper" - wonder how we tie in with Texas? lol.

I eat dinner. I used to drink pop.
What I know as trash, my grandmother calls rubbish. It makes me laugh every time. I don't know exactly why.

It's a rural (agricultural) vs. city thing: 'Dinner' was the big meal of the day, and served at midday, 'supper' was lighter, and served at night. Most folks nowdays are not agricultural workers and so eat their large meal at night, and hence call it 'dinner'. I've never heard that 'supper' was more casual than 'dinner', btw.

to me, it has always been "dinner" and "soda"

I grew up in Fairfield County, Ct. and we always called the evening meal dinner and the noontime meal lunch. It wasn't until I came up to West Hartford that I heard the terms supper and dinner respectively. In fact, the only time I ever heard the term supper growing up was to describe a midnight supper.

DH, the blessed Mr. Meatloaf, is a born-n-bred Brooklynite, and it was dinner. Small town in Missouri-me grew up hearing supper. Noonday meal was mostly lunch, except Sunday and sometimes during summer vacation, when both teacher-parents were home. The local vernacular for carbonated drinks was "sody" - not that I was allowed to pronounce it that way, you understand.

a pop in the south is a cold drink, dinner is lunch and supper is the evening meal. have also seen many different names for what we call in louisiana a poboy.

In Utah its dinner. And soda and pop are interchangeable :P

I grew up in Kansas City, raised by parents who were from Milwaukee. They called it "supper." I eventually ended up calling it dinner, since most of the kids in my KC suburb town referred to the evening meal as such.

I don't know if I've specifically heard that "supper" is less casual than "dinner," but in my mind I've always thought that to be the case. So I'm with hmw0029 on that one.

Lilla's explanation is how I've understood it as long as I can remember (lunch is midday, supper is evening, and dinner is whichever one is larger), although I never thought of dinner-at-lunchtime as specifically an agricultural thing. My grandparents served it then, and my grandfather was a pastor. I'd guess it was more a matter of whether the family was all available to eat together at lunchtime.

Makes me curious, come to think of it, whether their meal schedules got all screwed up when the kids went to school.

I grew up on a farm in Kansas but lived in New Jersey for years. Dinner is the main, big meal of the day. It can be at noon as in Sunday dinner or at night. Supper is at night.
I call it soda. Pop is what I called my Dad : )

Grew up in Philly and 'burbs. Dinner was the evening meal and never heard of soda being pop until I met my college roommate ~ who was from Pittsburgh. Used to tell her that "pop" is a colloquial expression for your father ~ just to bug her.

Maybe "pop"' in Louisiana is synonymous with a cold (soft) drink, but in my neck of the southern woods, when we wanted a soft drink/soda/pop, we'd ask for a "coke or something" (Soda is what you put in a scotch and soda ;)

Is there still such a thing as "Supper Clubs?"

i hate the word supper. i don't know why-it's just always made my skin crawl.
growing up (i'm a pittsburgher too) we called it pop, but since moving around the country soda & pop have become interchangable for me.

I grew up in central NY. "Supper" was what we ate when it was just our immediate family, but "dinner" was what we ate when there were guests invited.

(and it was and still is "soda".)

There is a distinct difference between supper and dinner in England (Nottingham), at least. My friend would often tell me what he ate for supper and dinner. It confused me at first when I would look at the clock + 5-6 hours and wonder why he was eating "dinner" that time of day. Is it regional there too?

I never heard "supper" growing up in Hawaii, with the exception of me joking with my parents when I was 4-5 years old, purposely calling it "suppermarket," one of many words I would distort just to get a reaction out of them.

Having moved eastward, I haven't heard supper uttered in natural conversation.

I grew up on a farm in SC. The big meal for farmers was always at midday which we called dinner. Supper usually consisted of left overs from dinner. When we invited the preacher over for Sunday dinner it was not at night but right after church.

In olden days they rang the "dinner bell" and I would guess they were referring to the mid-day meal when all the farm hands sat down together and broke bread.

Websters' defines dinner as the principle meal of the day so it is correct to refer to lunch as dinner if that one's major meal. Supper is defined as the evening meal when dinner is taken at midday.

This is probably the first time i've ever typed the words "soda" or "pop" as its either a "coke" or a "cold drink" for me.

I use dinner for both the mid-day meal and the evening meal depending on the situation...i cook "supper" at home for myself but i go out to "dinner" with friends...I eat "lunch" out with co-workers but my grandmother cooks sunday "dinner" at noon after church.

Native to Seattle I say dinner and I say pop.

brickh - yes it's a cold drink, a soft drink, or a coke in the south. My dad used to refer to cokes as "dopes" which came from the days when they contained cocaine. I recall coke trucks being called "dope wagons".

related to this topic I heard about DARE (Dictionary of American Regional English) on Splendid table the other day.
sounds interesting.
http://dare.wisc.edu/?q=node/163

My grandparents always called it supper. My parents call it dinner. I call it dinner. I think it is a generation thing.

As a German-Canadian I've understood them as entirely different meals.

Supper: Late meal, should be light as you're usually heading straight-off to bed (ie. breads, cold-cuts, cheeses, salads and veggies)

Dinner: A lunch/supper-time meal that is fulfilling and provides energy. (ie. stews, pastas, soups)

Dinner is early evening, supper is later

I grew up in New Orleans and we called soda "coke". As in the following exchange:

Me: I'm going to get a coke; would you like one?
Them: Sure.
Me: What kind?
Them: 7-Up

I had to learn to call them "soda" when I moved away from there.

In my house, dinner was the main meal of the day, usually in the evening except on Sunday or holidays. In that case it was usually early afternoon. Supper was used to refer to the evening meal exclusively.

Where I grew up in southern Virginia, it was "soda" and "supper". My stepdad from Missouri called it "dinner".

Here is New Orleans it's "cold drink" or "coke" and "dinner".

concord ma -- definitely dinner and soda. never used the word supper in my life!

I say supper and dinner interchangably for the evening meal. Mid-day is lunch. I also say soda and pop interchangably. Sometimes I get fancy and say sodapop.

Hmmmm...actually, I don't drink much in the way of fizzy canned beverages any more, so I guess in truth I'm more likely to say "beer."

Boston - supper. But on Sundays we ate "dinner" as the big meal after church.

I've lived in Atlanta all my life and have never referred to a nighttime meal as supper. It's always dinner (and soda). That said, I'm not very "southern" and know many people who, like RegrettableFoodie, refer to any soda as "coke." But I definitely think it's regional.

I grew up in Seattle to a Texan for a father and an Oklahoma schoolmarm for a mother. We all ate lunch. My father called the evening meal supper. I used dinner and supper interchangably. Unconsiously, I've taught my children to use the word dinner.
When it wasn't iced tea or Jim Beam, my Dad drank a soda pop. I've always drunk pop as have my children although we've all sworn off using any such beverage on a regular basis... Back to plain water or iced tea in the summer.

Just to clarify, once I moved away from New Orleans, I learned to say "soda."

People here in Portland say "pop" and I don't think I'll ever get used to it.

I detest the word supper. It conjures up images of gross casseroles and grayish limp green beans and jello molds. I have no idea why now that I think about it. Needless to say - I call it dinner.

I'm from NJ, and we always said 'dinnertime' or 'dinner.' However, from reading Peanuts comics, I read about 'supper' and 'suppertime,' and so always associated the term with the Midwest, since Charles Schultz was from Minnesota.

There are certainly many different associations with each term, as you all have observed, like 'supper clubs' and also the workman's mid-day 'dining pail' (when what we call lunch was the most substantial meal of the day).

In England, I was first thrown when people referred to having their 'tea' as dinner--not what we think of as 'tea/high tea' but what most call dinner or supper.

i call my evening meal "high tea" and carbonated drinks "the black waters of imperialism".

@ 1 stmakearoux... In Auburn Alabama there is the "War Eagle Supper Club" so yes, there are supper clubs.... just as there are dinner theaters.

Being from New England and having the correct opinion on all subject matter (just ask me), I can tell you for a fact that it is fine to, as I have, use dinner and supper interchangeably... in fact nothing gives me greater pleasure than when someone corrects me in the "proper" use of the word dinner, and I promptly tell them to go F&@! themselves! This is what gives us New Englanders our charm and grace...

Also, don't be afraid to respond the same with pop, coke, tonic or soda... It gives you a little MOXIE!

Dinner/soda for me, but I remember my days of being obsessed with the Little House books and they always called lunch dinner and dinner supper. Confused me for a bit as an 8 year old, but then I accepted it as being an old-fashioned thing. Of course, when I was pretending to be Laura Ingalls Wilder I'd say supper hahhaaa...

I grew up in New Orleans and it was dinner. And all carbonated beverages were Cokes.

I'm in Mississippi now, and I hear supper much more frequently, but not exclusively. And it's still Coke.

I grew up with the definition: lunch is at noon, supper is in the evening, and dinner is any meal that you eat on a holiday (Thanksgiving Dinner, etc).

Chris Kimbal (America's Test Kitchen) was on NPR today talking about America's Frugal Food Roots http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106227509 and he gave the origin of the words as ... Dinner was lunch, Supper was the later meal. Over the generations, I'm sure its morphed into different meanings depending on location.

The article doesn't talk about it, but the 7 minute play list would -- for what it's worth.

Like pjracz10, I grew up in Seattle, so it is "dinner" and "pop". However, like flavacrisp, I think it was also generational - my maternal grandparents called it "supper" (breakfast and lunch were the other two meals of the day), but my parents called it dinner. Interestingly, my dad's parents (immigrants from Norway during WWII) took ESL classes in Seattle in the 1940s and 1950s, and were taught that "Sunday dinner" was not the same as a week-day "supper" (Sunday dinner was more formal), so if my grandmother invited us over on Sunday or a holiday (like Thanksgiving), it was for dinner, but any other night of the week was for "supper".

I grew up in the northeast, but with a mother from the south. Dinner was lunch and supper was the evening meal. When I married it was into a very strong matriarchal family in the same northeast area and she made it clear that I was wrong:-) It really didn't matter and I now call our evening meal dinner.

I can't remember what my mother called soft drinks, but I remember that when I visited the south it was RC Cola and Dr. Pepper. Dr. Pepper made a stronger impression in the north than RC cola did. I call it soda now.

I grew up in the Northeast - raised by Northeastern parents. We always used the terms interchangeably and the mid-day meal was lunch. But we did have a neighbor who was raised in Kansas - and always called the mid-day meal dinner and the evening meal supper.

Supper sounds quaint and country-ish. I don't care for it.

@ nightowl

I grew up and still live in Southern Virginia, and yes, Soda is used quite often, but so is Coke. I've noticed more and more that when someone refers to soda in my area, they are talking about anything from 7-Up to ORange Crush. When someone says Coke, it could mean Coke, Pepsi, or even RC. Nobody calls root beer Soda or Coke. It's always Root Beer.

Where I live both terms "supper" and "dinner" were used, and often it meant nothing more than the evening meal. They weren't used in proper context. My mother would tell me what time "dinner" would be ready, but when she called me home from outside, she would yell "supper's ready".

i just learned this teh other day from a Canadian friend...

In FRANCE:
Breakfast = Petit Déjeuner
Lunch = Déjeuner
Dinner = Dîner

In CANADA
Breakfast = Déjeuner
Lunch = Dîner
Dinner = Supper

i guess it's all french to me...

I'm with gastronomeg: The word "supper" just bugs me. I am a dinner/soda, but so is everyone I know here in the NYC area. Growing up in Central Ohio, all the kids around me were dinner/pop.

I'm from MS and we called it dinner, though i have heard it called suppertime. a soda was coke and it didn't matter the brand except root beer and that was Barq's or A&W. having lived in the north for far too long--i have heard others call it pop and soda, or just by the brand name. while I am in FL now the area I am in might as well just be an extension of the north.

i'm australian.

i consider "supper" to be either a light dinner, or it could also be a small snack (not something you would think of as desert) some time after dinner.

i don't use "soda" or "pop": soda i understand, but "pop" to me is a sound,not a drink. i call it soft drink.

'Supper' comes from the same root word as 'soup'. It was originally a light meal containing soup and bread eaten right before bedtime. Dinner was the midday meal and was the one with the meat in it.

Here in Britain, there's also a meal known as 'tea', which is an early supper, usually very light (maybe some cheese on toast). It's more common in the North and in Scotland.

I grew up in Northern California and it has always been "dinner" as the evening meal and "soda". It makes me giggle when I hear people say "pop", it's always seemed old-fashioned to me. When I was little, I remembering asking what the difference was between dinner and supper and I seem to rembmer that it was explained to me that dinner was lunch and supper was the evening meal. But also that supper was more informal than dinner.
I always thought it was a regional thing (or maybe, depending on the country?)

Dinner always refers to the largest meal of the day. If you have your largest meal mid-day then it would be referred to as dinner and your evening meal would be a supper. However if you have your largest meal in the evening then it would be dinner and your mid-day meal is lunch.

I grew up in Nova Scotia, and for me, while Supper and Dinner were used interchangeably, carbonated beverages were always referred to as pop. The only time I'd hear Dinner being referred to for a time other than supper-time would be if one was talking about "Sunday Dinner at Church" or something of that sort.

Lunch was referred to as Lunch, but in my memory, I can hear my mother calling "supperrr" or "dinnerr" for the evening meal and I think it depended on her mood.

Pop for me is dark, like Coke, Pepsi, etc.

Soda is clear, like club soda, Sprite, 7 UP, tonic, etc.

South western Ontario, represent!

I grew up in central MA. The evening meal was supper. The midday meal was lunch, expect on Sundays or holidays. Then it was dinner. These days I tend to call the evening meal dinner. The midday meal is still lunch.

Carbonated beverages have always been soda to me. The only person who called them tonic was my grandmother.

dinner and soda. And I'm in CT.

I'm with Kappamaki.

I live in Northern Autralia and for me it's either dinner or tea, depending on my mood. In my family they are interchangeable, but supper is almost never mentioned, unless we are visiting my Grandparents.

And it's neither soda nor pop. It's soft drink. Or we call it by the type ie "Do you want a lemonade?"

Poultrygeist (great name!) was right in citing Webster's that it's the largest meal (but not breakfast). So to the extent it was regional it was because the largest meal was more likely to be at noon in agricultural country, and then the evening meal was supper. As we've become more urban more of us who used to have dinner at noon now have it at suppertime, and have lunch at noon.

My mother grew up in Massachusetts where they called soda "tonic." When my sister had to be taken to the Dr in Texas where they were stationed during the War ('40's) he told her my sister needed some tonic, and mom couldn't imagine why.

I have lived in Missouri (St. Louis) all my life. We always called the second meal of the day "Lunch", and the last meal of the day, "Supper". Although Dinner and Supper could be used interchangeably My husband's family did the same thing.. I notice my older siblings are now calling it "dinner" when they invite us over. I have always used the word Supper unless we are going out to a formal meal, then I will call it Dinner.

We have always used the word soda. My uncle used to call it sodie.

I think it depends on what's served. We have "chicken dinner," "lasagna dinner," "steak dinner," "breakfast for dinner," "chili supper," spaghetti supper," "soup and salad supper." "Lasagna supper" just doesn't sound right.

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