Usage of "a light lunch"

English as a Second Language English Vocabulary, Grammar and Idioms
1

Hi,

I usually get up at 6. And I have a light breakfast.

As far as I know, the indefinite article ‘a’ doesn’t come before breakfast, lunch, dinner. In this case, why does ‘a’ come? What do you think?

Thanks… and Happy Lunar New Year!!
sweetpumpkin

2

Hi Sweetpumpkin,

You are right when you say that there is no article before meals as in: We have breakfast at 8, lunch at 1 and dinner at 7 but when you qualify these nouns (add an adjective), they become countable nouns and we add the article. We say: At that hotel we had a huge breakfast.

Alan