What is the difference between meal and food?
meal | food |
(senseid)Food that is prepared and eaten, usually at a specific time (e.g. breakfast = morning meal, lunch = noon meal, etc).
* {{quote-magazine, year=2013, month=July-August, author=(Henry Petroski)
, title= Food served or eaten as a repast.
* {{quote-magazine, year=2012, month=March-April, author=Anna Lena Phillips, volume=100, issue=2, page=172
, magazine=(American Scientist)
, title= The coarse-ground edible part of various grains often used to feed animals; flour.
* {{quote-magazine, year=2013, month=July-August, author=(Henry Petroski)
, title= To defile or taint.
(uncountable) Any substance that can be consumed by living organisms, especially by eating, in order to sustain life.
* {{quote-book, year=1922, author=(Ben Travers), title=(A Cuckoo in the Nest)
, chapter=1
Here's rattling good luck and roaring good cheer, / With lashings of food and great hogsheads of beer. […]”}}* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-29, volume=407, issue=8842, page=72-3, magazine=(The Economist)
, title= (countable) A foodstuff.
(uncountable, figuratively) Anything that nourishes or sustains.
* (and other bibiographic particulars) (William Shakespeare)
* (and other bibiographic particulars) (William Wordsworth)
As nouns the difference between meal and food
is that meal is (food that is prepared and eaten)Food that is prepared and eaten, usually at a specific time (e.g. breakfast = morning meal, lunch = noon meal, etc) while food is any substance that can be consumed by living organisms, especially by eating, in order to sustain life.As a verb meal
is to defile or taint.meal
English
Etymology 1
From (etyl), from (etyl) .Noun
(en noun)Geothermal Energy, volume=101, issue=4, magazine=(American Scientist) , passage=Energy has seldom been found where we need it when we want it. Ancient nomads, wishing to ward off the evening chill and enjoy a meal around a campfire, had to collect wood and then spend time and effort coaxing the heat of friction out from between sticks to kindle a flame. With more settled people, animals were harnessed to capstans or caged in treadmills to turn grist into meal.}}
Sneaky Silk Moths, passage=Last spring, the periodical cicadas emerged across eastern North America. Their vast numbers and short above-ground life spans inspired awe and irritation in humans—and made for good meals for birds and small mammals.}}
Hyponyms
* See alsoDerived terms
* make a meal of * meal mob * meal station * meal ticketEtymology 2
From (etyl) mele, from (etyl) . More at (l).Noun
(-)Geothermal Energy, volume=101, issue=4, magazine=(American Scientist) , passage=Ancient nomads, wishing to ward off the evening chill and enjoy a meal around a campfire, had to collect wood and then spend time and effort coaxing the heat of friction out from between sticks to kindle a flame. With more settled people, animals were harnessed to capstans or caged in treadmills to turn grist into meal .}}
Derived terms
* mealy * cornmeal * oatmealEtymology 3
Variation of mole (compare (etyl) mail), from (etyl) mole, mool, from (etyl) . More at (l).Verb
(en verb)- Were he meal'd with that / Which he corrects, than were he tyrannous. ? Shakespeare.
Anagrams
* 1000 English basic words ----food
English
Noun
(en-noun)citation, passage=“[…] the awfully hearty sort of Christmas cards that people do send to other people that they don't know at all well. You know. The kind that have mottoes like
Here's rattling good luck and roaring good cheer, / With lashings of food and great hogsheads of beer. […]”}}
A punch in the gut, passage=Mostly, the microbiome is beneficial. It helps with digestion and enables people to extract a lot more calories from their food than would otherwise be possible. Research over the past few years, however, has implicated it in diseases from atherosclerosis to asthma to autism.}}
- Mozart and Bach are food for my soul.
- This may prove food to my displeasure.
- In this moment there is life and food / For future years.