What we eat

"A certain logic dictates why we eat three meals a day, not two or four; why table manners are standard at dinner when hardly any social rules apply to breakfast; why we consume orange juice in the morning and sandwiches at lunch; why people snack on peanuts at circuses and hot dogs at baseball parks.

"There are even reasons for garnishing casseroles with potato chips and calling TV dinners 'TV dinners,' even though manufacturers did not originally intend for consumers to eat them in front of a TV. This book is about those reasons."

Abigail Carroll in "Three Squares: The Invention of the American Meal"