Part 1 of Essay
For the well to do, eating during the Elizabethan and Jacobean periods was a fancy affair. A king or queen when going abroad could expect banquet tables filled with hundreds of dishes--for just one meal! There was much pageantry and entertainment. At Leicester, Queen Elizabeth I (predecessor of King James VI & I) were gree ....

Part 2 of Essay
.... of crystal and silver dishes served by dozens, sometimes hundreds, of gentlemen. Rich Elizabethans dined twice a day--breakfast at eleven or twelve and supper between five and six. Of course, the meals of the common man were not so extravagant. The common man ate three meals a day: breakfast in the early am, dinner at twelve and supper at six. The poorer sort supped when they could. A poem by Thomas Tusser gives a good idea of the break fast of the typical farmer: Call Servants to breakfast, by daystar appear, ....