Dinner is Breakfast!!! page

[Gorbag]

Eating a meal in the early morning hours is a modern invention and the first meal of the day was originally eaten around Noon according to historians. What paleo man actually did we cannot know, but it is very unlikely that an early breakfast was on his mind when waking up. The etymological background for the word “Dinner” states that “dinner” mean “breakfast” and that it was the first meal of the day eaten at Noon:

“Originally, dinner referred to the first meal of a two-meal day, a heavy meal occurring about noon, which broke the night's fast in the new day. The word is from the Old French (ca 1300) disner, meaning "breakfast", from the stem of Gallo-Romance desjunare ("to break one's fast"), from Latin dis- ("undo") + Late Latin ieiunare ("to fast"), from Latin ieiunus ("fasting, hungry").^[3][4] The Spanish word "desayuno", the Romanian "dejun", and the French "déjeuner" retain this etymology (such as Portuguese "desjejum", while referring to breakfast). Eventually, the term shifted to referring to the heavy main meal of the day, even if it had been preceded by a breakfast meal.”

Dinner - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Personally I am convinced that modern man did a big mistake by the invention of an early morning meal - “breakfast” - overloading his stomach by food in the early hours when the intestines are still busy by digesting and getting rid of food, detoxicating from the day before, and that people should have kept on to the good and proven tradition of not eating any solid food in the AM.

So, what about people in the primal community, do you still eat an early breakfast?

[namelesswonder]

Depending on how late one is eating, I would need to see evidence about this digestion and detoxification that you claim occurs in the morning. I don't recall reading about that before. Food passes from the stomach within a couple of hours, I believe, so I'm not sure what it would be doing that requires much waking effort overnight.

I have read that it is better to eat heavier in the morning and afternoon, and have a light dinner, so your body isn't trying to digest a large meal while you sleep. It's not like your intestines ever stop anyway. Provided you are not eating things that cause you to pass waste too quickly, the entire digestive process takes more than a day, from mouth to toilet (or ground, hopefully not the floor though).

If what you've described is the case, I feel that an early morning meal was incorporated because of work schedules. It's impractical to stop working mid-morning for a meal. I could wait until 10 AM or later (getting up at 6:30 AM 5 days of the week) for breakfast, as I'm usually only "kind of" hungry in the morning, but it's not practical for me to eat a reasonable meal at work.

[Neckhammer]

I still eat my first meal at about noon. Actually thats one thing that didn't change from pre-primal life to now.

[sjmc]

I once asked someone where the 3-squares-a-day paradigm even comes from (I'll never remember what the main thread was about...) and I was told that it originated with farmers who were up before the sun and doing heavy physical labor all day long.

Personally, no food in the AM is the default for me.

[AdamC29]

BBC News - Breakfast, lunch and dinner: Have we always eaten them?

an interesting article on the origins of the 3 square meals

[paleodog]

I do not eat breakfast anymore. I am a performance/competitive cyclist and will sometimes have a banana (1) or a handful of blueberries before a workout but that's it. Otherwise I skip eating anything in the am and sometimes skip lunch or will have a leafy green salad. Dinner, I usually have fish and veggies. Energy is great, no illnesses and I am ripped and lean.

[sarahelyse]

I've always wondered about breakfast. If I were living in prehistoric times, would I have woken up and just had food sitting around to eat? I've never been a big breakfast person anyway.

[Drumroll]

Breakfast = break fast = whenever your first meal is = does not have to be in morning.

Just my simple thoughts on that one.

[Ayla2010]

Generally no. Its rare I am hungry first thing in the morning.

[Leida]

I get up before 4 am, and my supper from the night before has disappeared without a trace unless I overate. I usually take oil about 6 am once I am at work, and by 7-8 am I am VERY ready to eat my first meal. Luckily, our management has no problems with people eating at the workstations while working. What I keep trying to do is to not overeat in the evening, keeping the supper light & fluid intake low. I would rather have my food coming while I am active than before going to bed.

Dunno either how accurate the historic reference is, as the stuff I am reading on the medieval mysteries indicates a very early morning breakfast for at least the monasteries (granted that's a couple of different authors....) They always break their fast on oat cakes, or watered ale and bread, milksop etc at dawn or shortly before dawn.