Why eating three meals a day became the norm in many parts of the world

Pop quiz: name the world’s most famous trio? If you’re a foodie, then your answer might have been breakfast, lunch and dinner. It’s an almost universally accepted trinity – particularly in the Western world.

But how did it come about?

The first meals

Early humans were nomadic. Forming small communities, they would travel with the seasons, following local food sources.

While we can only guess what daily mealtimes rhythms looked like, evidence dating back 30,000 years from the South Moravia region, Czech Republic, shows people visited specific settlements time and again. They gathered around hearths, cooking and sharing food: the first signs of human “commensality”, the practice of eating together.

One of the best-preserved hunter-gatherer sites we’ve found is Ohalo II – located on the shores of the modern-day Sea of Galilee (also called Lake Tiberias or Lake Kinneret) in Israel, and dating back some 23,000 years.

In addition to several small dwellings with hearths, it provides evidence of diverse food sources, including more than 140 types of seeds and nuts, and various birds, fish and mammals.

The development of agricultural knowledge some 12,000 years ago gave rise to permanent settlements. The earliest were in the Levant region (across modern-day Iraq, southwestern Iran and eastern Turkey), in an area called the “Fertile Crescent”.

Permanent agriculture led to the production...

Read more