Tiffin
Type of Indian breakfast
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Related on Lably
Through Indian subcontinent, British Raj and South India
Etymology
In the British Raj, tiffin was used to denote the British custom of afternoon tea that had been supplanted by the Indian practice of having a light meal at that hour. It is derived from "tiffing", an English colloquial term meaning to take a little drink. By 1867 it had become naturalised among Anglo-Indians in northern British India to mean luncheon.
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Current usage
In South India and in Nepal, tiffin is generally breakfast or a snack between meals: dosas, idlis, vadas etc. In other parts of India, such as Mumbai, the word mostly refers to a packed lunch of some sort. In Mumbai, it is often delivered to them by dabbawalas, sometimes known as tiffin wallahs, who use a complex system to get thousands of tiffin carriers to their destinations. In most of India, a school-going child's lunch box is fondly called a tiffin box. It is also used heavily in Pakistan where people use tiffin boxes in places like offices, schools or during picnic. This practice is also common in India.
When used in place of the word "lunch", tiffin often consists of rice, lentils, curry, vegetables, chapatis or "spicy meats". In addition, the lunch boxes are themselves called tiffin carriers, tiffin-boxes or just tiffins.