Even those who do not have time for breakfast, or who pass up the late-night supper, sit down to a substantial comida in the afternoon. Translating comida as "lunch", as is often done, does not do it justice, for it is nothing like the lunch that most are used to. It is served later than most people north-of-the-border would eat lunch. It is much more like the old-fashioned mid-day dinners that people ate in the United States back when a larger percentage of the population were living in small towns or on farms and the three daily meals were breakfast, dinner and supper.

The comida, more than any other meal, is still structured and hasn't changed much even in the last hundred years. It starts off with a soup course, called the sopa aguada, which may be anything from a clear broth to a rich cream soup. This is followed by the sopa seca, which is either a rice or pasta dish. Although rice would normally be served with the main course in many other countries, Mexican tradition dictates that it be served separately. Next comes the main course, which may be a meat or chicken guisado - stew - or mole, meatballs in sau

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