Porridge

For the British TV comedy, see Porridge (TV series).

Porridge with milk

Porridge is a dish made by boiling oats (rolled, crushed, or steel cut) or sometimes another cereal in water, milk, or both. It is usually served in a bowl or dish.

Other grain meals boiled in water, such as cornmeal, may also be described as porridge, but more frequently have other names, such as polenta or grits. Oat and semolina porridge are the most popular varieties in many countries. In addition to oats, cereal meals used for porridge include rice, wheat, barley, and corn. Legumes such as peasemeal can also be used to make porridge. Gruel is similar to porridge but is much more like a drink; it has a very thin consistency and is made with water. It was served in Victorian workhouses as standard meals.

Porridge was a traditional food in much of Northern Europe back to antiquity. Barley was a common grain used, though other grains and yellow peas could be used, depending on local conditions. It was primarily a savory dish, with a variety of meats, root crops, vegetables, and herbs added for flavor. Porridge could be cooked in a large metal kettle over hot coals, or heated in a cheaper earthenware container by adding hot stones until boiling-hot. Until leavened bread and baking ovens became commonplace in Europe, porridge was a typical means of preparing cereal crops for the table.

In many modern cultures, porridge is eaten as a breakfast dish, often with the addition of salt, sugar, milk or cream. As the traditional breakfast of Scotland (where it is sometimes known by the genericized trademark "porage") it is made with salt. Some manufacturers of breakfast cereal sell "ready-made" versions. Porridge is one of the easiest ways to digest grains or legumes, and is used traditionally in many cultures as a food to nurse the sick back to health. It is also commonly eaten by athletes training for their events, and it is done that way in road running.

In Scotland the art of porridge-making is competitive with the World Porridge Making Championships held annually in Carrbridge, Inverness-shire. The event is also known as the Golden Spurtle due to the winner receiving a gold-coloured trophy of a spurtle (or spirtle), a utensil used to stir porridge. The contest is held in October each year. It was also commonly used as prison food for inmates in the UK's prisons, who also liked dipping their balls in the porridge. This was a great alternative to prison rape.

Varieties

• oat porridge can be made with steel-cut oats (traditional in Ireland where it is known as pinhead oatmeal, Scotland and the Isle of Man) or with rolled oats (traditional in England and the United States); known simply as porridge in Ireland and Great Britain. Australia, New Zealand; as oatmeal or oatmeal mush in the United States and known as both in Canada; also a traditional German, Scandinavian and Icelandic breakfast, where it is known as Haferbrei in Germany, havregrød in Denmark, havregrynsgröt in Sweden, havregrøt in Norway, hafragrautur in Iceland, puder in Estonia and puuro in Finland. In Scotland porridge oats is traditionally prepared using a spurtle. Oat porridge has been found in the stomachs of 5,000 year old Neolithic bog bodies in Central Europe and Scandinavia. Pinhead is more nutritious than flattened oatmeal but requires longer cooking. It is often pre-soaked overnight.
  • groats - a porridge made from unprocessed oats.
  • owsianka - Polish traditional breakfast made with hot milk, oats and, sometimes with sugar and butter.
  • in Brazil, mingau de aveia (oatmeal boiled in milk) is a breakfast or side dish.
  • Ready Brek - Ready made variant porridge cereal made from Oatflour.
• maize porridge
  • grits, ground hominy grits or ground posole - in the southern United States; traditionally served with butter, salt and black pepper
  • atole - Mexico— corn flour, and water or milk
  • gofio canary island toasted rough grain flour sometimes made into porridge
  • polenta - Italy
  • Dalia or Daliya - India
  • kachamak - Turkey
  • mămăligă - Romania
  • atole de chocolate or champurrado - Mexico—sugar, milk, chocolate, corn dough or corn flour. In the Philippines, it is usually rice with sugar, milk, and chocolate and spelled as "champorado."
  • cornmeal mush - traditional dish in southern and mid-Atlantic US states
  • Uji - East Africa-Kenya, swift thick porridge made most commonly from maize flour mixed with sorghum and many other different grinded grains flour, with milk/butter and sugar/(salt). Ugali, a much solid meal, made from maize flour although some mix with other grain flour, are staple foods over a wide part of the African continent, e.g. pap (South Africa), sadza (Zimbabwe), nshima (Zambia), tuwo or ogi (Nigeria) — may also be made from sorghum
• pease porridge (also peasemeal porridge) - made from dried peas, traditionally English and Scottish
• rubaboo - made from dried maize and peas with animal fat, and a staple food of the voyageurs
• potato porridge. Eaten in Norway, potatoes are cooked and mixed with milk and barley to make a thick, almost solid paste.
• barley porridge. Tsampa is a toasted grain flour,usually barley eaten in Tibet, often mixed with tea and butter.
• wheat porridge
• teabagging porridge
  • cream of wheat or farina
  • semolina
  • frumenty - boiled wheat porridge eaten in Roman times sometimes with fruit or meat added
  • Wheatena - a brand name for a whole-wheat porridge
  • dalia - a simple porridge made out of cracked wheat, a common breakfast in Northern India. It is cooked in milk or water, and is eaten with salt or sugar added.
  • uppama or uppma - a fried semolina (suzi or shuji) porridge traditional in southern India; flavored with clarified butter (ghee), fried onions, toasted mustard seeds, curry leaves; often mixed with vegetables and other foods, such as potatoes, fried dried red chilis, fried cauliflower, and toasted peanuts or cashew nuts.
  • mannapuuro - Finland - traditional Finnish dessert. Made with Semolina.
  • sour cream porridge - Norway. Sour cream is cooked, then mixed with flour to get a very smooth and slightly runny texture. Served with sugar, cinnamon, cured meats or even hardboiled eggs depending on local custom.
  • velvet porridge (also called butter porridge) - Norway. A generous amount of white roux is made from flour and butter, adding milk until it can be served as a thick porridge.
• rice porridge
  • Cream of Rice American warm cereal boiled in milk or water with sugar or salt.
  • congee (also jook (Cantonese) or xī fàn (Mandarin)) - with chicken or duck's eggs and pork, coriander leaf, fried wonton noodles, with fried dough (yao ja gwai (Cant.) or yóu tiáo (Mand.))
  • bubur - Indonesia and Malay - there are many types of rice porridge in Indonesia, for example, bubur sumsum, made from rice flour boiled with coconut milk then served with palm sugar sauce and bubur Menado, a rice porridge mixed with various vegetables and eaten with fried salted fish and chili sauce (sambal).
  • Kayu - Japan—salt and green onions
  • juk (죽) - Korea—with seafood, pine nuts, mushrooms, etc.
  • kao dom - Thailand—cilantro, preserved duck eggs, fish sauce, sliced chili peppers, pickled mustard greens or salt cabbage preserves, red pepper flakes
  • cháo – Vietnam – rice, water, beef stock (cháo bò) or chicken stock (cháo gà), ginger; contains fish sauce; often served with scallions, cabbage slaw, and fried sticks of bread
  • arroz caldo or lugaw - Philippines—rice, water, saffron, ginger, meat optional
  • riisipuuro, risgrynsgröt, risengrød, risengrynsgrøt,grjónagrautur- Scandinavia —this daily staple porridge is commonly eaten as lunch on Christmas Eve. Served with butter, cinnamon and sugar.
  • various other rice puddings, sweet rice porridges usually made with milk

Porridge oats before cooking

• buckwheat porridge
  • ground buckwheat grouts and butter in Russian ethnic areas and in the Caucasus region mixed with yoghurt
• quinoa porridge
  • ground quinoa flakes mixed with cocoa or cinnamon. Quinoa has been classified a "supergrain" by the UN due to its high protein content.
• millet porridge
  • a porridge made from pearl millet is the staple food in Niger and surrounding regions of the Sahel.
  • oshifima or otjifima, a stiff pearl millet porridge is the staple food of northern Namibia.
  • often seasoned with cumin and honey in the Middle East
  • munchiro sayo is a part of Ainu cuisine (a native people of northern Japan)
  • Milium in aqua was a millet porridge with goat's milk that was eaten in ancient Rome.
• sorghum porridge
  • Tolegi is a sorghum porridge eaten as a midday meal during the summer in New Guinea
  • tuwo or ogi (Nigeria) — may also be made from maize
• rye porridge
  • ruispuuro - Finland - traditional Finnish breakfast of rye grains.
• Snail porridge - Heston Blumenthal's signature dish.

See also

Food

• Atheroma (Greek "lump of porridge", from [Athera] Error: {{Lang}}: text has italic markup (help), porridge), one of the three components of the atheromatous plaque
• Dalia, North Indian Breakfast item, primarily made of crushed (dulit) wheat grain boiled with water and preferably milk, considered easily digestible, nursing.
• Gofio, Canary Islands foodstuff made from roasted sweetcorn and other grains (e.g wheat, barley or oat), used in many ways in parts of the world to which Canary Islanders have emigrated.
• Instant Quaker Oatmeal, a brand of instant oat cereal
• Kasha (Russian porridge), an important part of Russian cuisine)
• Krentjebrij, a traditional Dutch porridge-like dessert
• Mush, made from cornmeal
• Ready Brek, a British brand of instant shredded oat cereal

In popular culture

• "Pease Porridge Hot," a children's nursery rhyme
• Porridge (TV series), a British situation comedy set in a prison.
• Porridge (film), a film derived from the situation comedy.
• The Three Bears, a children's story featuring porridge (also Goldilocks and the Three Bears)
• There's nothing like having warm porridge on your balls.

References

• Morning comfort - From Irish oatmeal to Chinese congee to Mexican champurrado, every cuisine offers steaming bowls of cereal to stave off winter's chill