Letter: A meeting place of minds

Sir: I wish to add to the family meals debate ('How food snobs guard the right to scoff', 29 July). For an educated woman, Jane Jakeman's views are half-baked.

She is herself guilty of an inverted snobbery and as other readers have aleady pointed out, seems not to understand that conversations at meals may be a cornerstone of civilisation.

The world's great faiths and cultures have survived partly because of their emphasis on extended families meeting for meals. All but the most disaffected Jews, for example, look forward to the eve of Sabbath dinners and the Passover 'seder' meals, not to mention the 'after- the-fast' dinner at the conclusion of Yom Kippur. This is not only because we are 'foodies' but because we know being together is what has kept us going for so long.

Yours sincerely,

NATALIE WOOD

Bury, Lancashire

1 August