crowdie, crowdy Sc. and north. Eng.
(ˈkraʊdɪ)
Also 7 croudy.
[Derivation unknown.
Jamieson conjectured some connexion with grout, and Icel. groutr porridge; this suits the sense, but leaves phonetic conditions unsatisfied.]
1. Meal and water stirred together so as to form a thick gruel. Frequently used as a designation for food of the brose or porridge kind in general. Jamieson. Now Obs. or only traditionally known.
| 1668 Ld. Newbottle Cakes o' Croudy in Jacobite Songs, Bannocks of bear meal, cakes of Croudy. 1724 Ramsay Tea-t. Misc. (1733) I. 91 Powsowdy and drummock and crowdy. 1804 Anderson Cumbrld. Ballads 112 For dinner I'd hev a fat crowdy. 1855 Robinson Whitby Gloss., Crowdy, oatmeal and water boiled to a paste and eaten with salt, or thinned with milk and sweetened. Spoonmeat in general. 1862 Smiles Engineers III. 238 There he [Stephenson] had his breakfast of ‘crowdie’, which he made with his own hands. It consisted of oatmeal stirred into a basin of hot water..which was supped with cold sweet milk. |
2. In some parts of the north of Scotland, a peculiar preparation of milk.
‘In Ross-shire it denotes curds with the whey pressed out, mixed with butter, nearly in an equal proportion’ (Jamieson).
| 1820 Glenfergus II. 275 (Jam.) Then came..the remains of a cog of crowdy, that is, of half butter, half cheese. 1938 L. MacNeice I crossed Minch ii. xii. 167 For my tea I had..a large hunk of ‘crowdy’. Ibid. 168 ‘Crowdy’ is a kind of..crumbly cream cheese, pure white and with practically no taste. 1946 Farmhouse Fare (ed. 2) 274 In Aberdeenshire a delicious crowdie is made from buttermilk. |
3. Comb., as crowdie-time; crowdy-mowdy = crowdie 1, ‘generally denoting milk and meal boiled together’ (Jam.); also humorously as a term of endearment.
| 1500–20 Dunbar Poems, In Secreit Place 46 My tyrlie myrlie, my crowdie mowdie. 1724 Ramsay Tea-t. Misc. (1733) I. 21 With crowdy mowdy they fed me. 1787 Burns Holy Fair vi, Then I gaed hame at crowdie-time. |