Lunch, previously translated as “second breakfast”, begins at 12 o’clock. At this time of day, people usually eat pizza, tuna salad or pasta – macaroni with sauce. However, the most popular food for lunch is a sandwich and Coca-Cola.
Lunch in America begins at five or six o’clock in the evening, no later than seven, and is close in time to Russian dinner. It is customary to eat hot dishes for lunch – meat, fish, poultry, vegetable salad or a side dish of stewed vegetables.
Popular alcoholic drinks include Californian wines, rum, bourbon, whiskey (called in the Irish manner – whiskey) and local beer (Budweiser, Miller, Philadelphia’s Yuengling, Lone Star, Anchor Steam, Purple Haze, Fat Tire, Turbo Dog and Coors). It should be noted that the country consumes quite a lot of alcohol, despite the long-standing temperance movement. The “Prohibition” of the 1920s only enriched bootleggers and increased crime. Alcohol consumption has been growing in recent years, reaching a 25-year high in 2010. Americans prefer coffee to tea, with more than half of the adult population drinking at least one cup a day. Thanks to extensive marketing by US companies, orange juice and milk (now often low-fat) have become popular breakfast drinks. During the 1980s and 1990s, the calorie content of American food increased by 24%; frequent fast food eating has led to the so-called “obesity epidemic” affecting 68% of the population. Highly sweetened soft drinks are popular; sugar in beverages accounts for 9% of the average American’s daily calorie intake.