alimentation vs meal

alimentation and meal both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
alimentation	Yes	No	No	No
meal	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, meal is a hyponym of alimentation; that is, meal is a word with a more specific, narrower meaning than alimentation:

alimentation (noun)	meal (noun)
the act of supplying food and nourishment	the food served and eaten at one time
a source of materials to nourish the body	coarsely ground foodstuff; especially seeds of various cereal grasses or pulse
	any of the occasions for eating food that occur by custom or habit at more or less fixed times