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I grew up in New England, and I'm not sure what other families did, but we never called the nighttime meal "dinner." We always called it "supper." Now I always call it dinner. I don't know when it changed, but somewhere along the line it did.
AOL Food has a fun poll where they ask you what you called certain food things in your region. Did you call it dinner or supper (there's also an "other" option, though I'm not sure what that would be). Sprinkles or Jimmies or 100s and 1000s? Sub, Hero, or Hoagie? Soda, Pop, or Tonic?
That last one reminds me of the day my grade school class went to New York City. One of the tips from our teachers was to not say "tonic" because they might not know what we mean. We were told to call it "pop." My friend Peter was a wiseass and kept asking everyone for "tonic." One clerk even said to him, "you mean pop?" And Peter said "no, I want some tonic."
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9-07-2007 @2:50PM ann lemons said... Yes, it was supper in rural Missouri. The noon meal was lunch at school but at home, the noon meal was called dinner, mostly. Calling the evening meal dinner was something people did in the movies.
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9-07-2007 @2:58PM Kent Mackey said... Dinner. Pop. Sub. I grew up in Ohio. One of the weirdest practices I've come across, is that in the South EVERYONE calls EVERY type of soft drink COKE. I could never figure out how to tell people I really wanted a Sprite. :)
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9-07-2007 @3:51PM amber said... the supper thing was something I grew up with in the South. I'm now living in the Pacific NW, and everyone says dinner. to me, that was lunch.
Oh, and Kent was right, down south, everything is either 'coke' or 'beer'. Or sweet iced tea! :)
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9-07-2007 @4:05PM vaca said... yeah, I remember that the city where I went to college had that "coke" thing but the mexican version (somewhere south of Texas)... that first time a waitress asked what flavor coke I wanted was.. well.. awkward, but shortly after I got the hang of it and would ask for an orange coke for example.
http://www.lavacahacemu.com
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9-07-2007 @4:10PM Ryan said... I grew up in Connecticut and we definitely called it "supper." I was surprised when I came to NY when people started laughing at me. "Dinner" is something fancy, or refers to eating out. Supper is just something you throw together at home.
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9-07-2007 @4:19PM karen said... I hatehatehate the word Supper. Drives me nuts. I use the word Dinner. Southeastern Virginia here.
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9-07-2007 @4:24PM pbpmom3 said... My husband is from CT and he calls sprinkles (jimmies) SHOTS! Has anyone else heard of this?
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9-07-2007 @4:32PM mcw2 said... I grew up in Rhode Island and it was supper for us too. I was just thinking of this the other day and wondering when I made the switch from "supper" to "dinner".
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9-07-2007 @4:46PM artifex said... I'm from Texas. My grandma called supper dinner, but we called it supper. Coke, at least in our house, wasn't generic for cola, and especially not soda in general. Sometimes we'd call it soda pop.
I have a feeling some of you are a lot older than I am :) I'm in my 30s.
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9-07-2007 @4:56PM jim said... Growing up in Michigan my dad used to call it chow! Wonder what my mom used to think about that?
http://www.healthydiabeticmeals.com
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9-07-2007 @5:51PM Amanda said... It was always dinner. The only person who I knew that called it supper was my best friend's mom. It would always confuse me when I was younger. Any soda can be referred to as Coke. When my cousins from Pennsylvania came to visit us, they said 'pop' and we thought it was the funniest thing. And I have never heard any other word for sprinkles but sprinkles.
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9-07-2007 @6:00PM h0mi said... "Pop" in NYC? no way.
Never called it supper either.
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9-07-2007 @6:23PM Bob Sassone said... h0mi: It might have been "soda" and not "pop," can't remember exactly.
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9-07-2007 @6:33PM Mike G said... In Australia the evening meal is sometimes called 'tea' by the older generation or in rural areas, though 'dinner' is more widespread now.
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9-07-2007 @7:06PM amber said... you know, in the Bible its termed 'the Last Supper'. does that mean everyone who calls it dinner now is disagreeing with God? :)
*sorry, couldn't resist!
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9-07-2007 @7:24PM Silver_Potato said... Pop till I moved down to California, then I got so much grief so I started calling it Soda.
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9-07-2007 @7:39PM LM said... I grew up in Philadelphia in the 50's and 60's and it was dinner, soda, hoagies and jimmies. Pop was my father.
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9-07-2007 @7:26PM beanspants said... central texas, and it was dinner or supper, interchangable. family lunch on saturday or sunday was also dinner or lunch, interchangable. school lunch was lunch.
and coke is just for dark colas. if you wanted sprite or 7up, you just say sprite or 7up.
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9-07-2007 @8:36PM Laura said... I am from RI, but I believe I've only used dinner. Supper sounds normal, but I don't believe I've ever actually used it.
I loved the bubbler question, makes me homesick. If only they including milk shake/cabinet!
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9-07-2007 @8:38PM k said... I suspect the subtle change for most people who switched from "supper" to "dinner" is exposure to restaurants. As you began to eat out with more regularity, you read menus which were for breakfast, lunch and dinner. I've traveled far and wire but I've yet to see a "supper menu" in a restaurant. Of course, the next poster will tell me all about them, now, but in any case, I suspect it's just a simple matter of menus setting the tone for your word choice.
I was born in Washington, D.C., and have lived in DC, Colorado, Utah, California, Guam and Hawaii. In every instance, in every place, it was "dinner" "sprinkles" "sub sandwich" and as for soda ... none of the above. My family has always, always, referred to them as "soft drinks." Again, probably because that's how they are referred to on menus and marketing materials. A close second would be "soda."
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