porridge, n.
(ˈpɒrɪdʒ)
Forms: 6 porage, porradge, 6–7 -edge, 6–8 -ige, 6–8 (9 dial.) -age, 7 -idg, Sc. (9 dial.) -itch, 7– porridge. β. 6 parage, 8 dial. parrage, 9 Sc. parridge, -itch.
[Altered form of pottage, poddish (cf. porringer). In sense 1, possibly influenced by porray. In Sc. and Eng. dial., usually construed as collective plural.]
† 1. a. Pottage or soup made by stewing vegetables, herbs, or meat, often thickened with pot-barley or other farinaceous addition. Cf. gruel n. 3. Obs.
| c 1532 G. Du Wes Introd. Fr. in Palsgr. 1070 Ye have alredy eaten your porage. 1538 Bale Thre Lawes 1566 They loue no pese porrege nor yet reade hearynges in lent. 1550 Lever Serm. (Arb.) 122 Hauyng a fewe porage made of the brothe of the same byefe, wyth salte and otemell. 1561 Hollybush Hom. Apoth. 18 b, Take a dishe full of Hempe sede..Braye it well and strayne it wyth warme water so that it become as a thyn parage. 1573 Tindale's Obed. Chr. Man Wks. 166 If the porage [1528 podech] be burned..or the meate ouer rosted, we say The bishop hath put his foote in the potte. 1577 B. Googe Heresbach's Husb. ii. (1586) 56 This sort [of Colwoorts]..is sod with Baken and vsed in Porredge. 1601 B. Jonson Poetaster iii. iv, He will eate a legge of mutton, while I am in my porridge. 1660–1 Pepys Diary 25 Feb., There we did eat some nettle porrige, which was made on purpose to day,..and was very good. 1748 Susanna Darwin in E. Darwin's Life (1879) 8 Till one, Pease Porrage, Pottatoes and Apple Pye. 1755 Johnson, Porridge.., food made by boiling meat in water; broth. 1805 Med. Jrnl. XIV. 427 Some persons have been rendered delirious by eating porridge, wherein it [Fool's parsley] had been used instead of parsley. |
b. See
plum-porridge.
2. A soft food made by stirring oatmeal (or
occas. some other meal or cereal) into boiling water (or milk); in cooling, it becomes more or less congealed. Often with distinguishing word, as
oatmeal p.,
wheatmeal p.,
rice p.| a 1643 W. Cartwright Bill of Fare Comedies, etc. (1651) 228 Imprimis some Rice Porredge, sweet, and hot. a 1674 Clarendon Hist. Reb. xiii. §86 Here he had such Meat and Porridge as such People use to have. 1705 Wall Hist. Inf. Bapt. (1844) I. xix. 355 Having his belly filled, and his head bedulled, with Scotch porridge. a 1776 in Herd Collect. Scot. Songs II. 182 Ye's get a panfu' of plumpin parrage; And butter in them. 1816 Scott Old Mort. vi, They're gude parritch eneugh. 1856 Kane Arct. Expl. II. xix. 193 Cooked them a porridge of meat-biscuits and pea-soup. 1859 Jephson Brittany ix. 139 Oatmeal porridge formed a considerable part of the people's food. |
3. fig. a. A conglomeration, a hotchpotch; unsubstantial stuff.
| 1642 G. Calsine (title) A Messe of Pottage, very well seasoned and crumbd, with Bread of Life,..against the contumelious slanderers of the Divine Service, terming it Porrage. 1662 Pepys Diary 24 Aug., Young people..crying out ‘Porridge’ often and seditiously in the Church, and they took the Common Prayer Book, they say, away. 1705 Hickeringill Priest-cr. ii. ii. 22 All other Devotion in the Church is but Porridge, as they prophanely word it; give us Sermons, Sermons, Long-winded Sermons. 1790 Burke Fr. Rev. Wks. V. 41 A..sermon, in which there are some good moral and religious sentiments,..mixed up in a sort of porridge of various political opinions and reflexions. 1852 P. Parley's Ann. 81 Peter Parley's literary porridge for the month of March. 1972 Listener 18 May 662/2 Sometimes the programme has been a radio porridge, sometimes a shapely..necklace of sound, but never anything really remarkable. 1976 Brit. Jrnl. Sociol. XXVII. 36 On the other side of the great divide are the empiricists who..correlate vaguely-worded, interchangeable scales with each other and call the subsequent statistical porridge, alienation. |
b. transf. Something of the consistency of thick soup or porridge.
| 1700 S. Sewall Diary 5 Dec., Because of the Porrige of snow, Bearers..rid to the Grave. 1870 Scribner's Monthly I. 154 While the engineers were floundering in the porridge at the west end, they wisely resolved to..sink a shaft to grade. 1966 H. Sheppard Dict. Railway Slang (ed. 2) 9 Porridge, sludge removed from drains. |
c. A prison sentence; a term of imprisonment.
slang.| 1954 Britannica Bk. of Year 637/1 Several examples of underworld slang, probably of a date earlier than 1953, appeared in the newspapers. Thus, the reader learned that Porridge meant a term of imprisonment. 1955 D. Webb Deadline for Crime i. 16 He did his porridge quietly, peacefully, earned full remission and came out. 1958 F. Norman Bang to Rights iii. 171 Week excuses that's all you get, when you go away to do a bit of porridge. 1968 J. Wainwright Edge of Extinction 92 D'you think I'd forget the frigging jack 'ut sent me down for two years' porridge? 1972 J. Brown Chancer xiii. 169 You think I'm not sick of doing porridge too? 1977 ‘E. Crispin’ Glimpses of Moon xii. 236 His emotions at the prospect..of yet another dose of porridge were such that he was..incapable of thinking clearly. |
4. In proverbial phrases;
e.g. a mess of porridge: see
mess n. 2;
not to earn salt to one's porridge,
i.e. to earn practically nothing;
to keep one's breath to cool one's (own) porridge, to reserve one's advice, etc. for one's own use (
cf. pottage 4).
to make a porridge, to blunder, to make a mess
of something.
| 1596 Nashe Saffron Walden 75 He carries the poake for a messe of porredge in Christs Colledge. 1678 Dryden Limberham iv. i, That is a chip in porridge; it is just nothing. 1694 Motteux Rabelais v. xxviii. (1737) 129 Spare your Breath to cool your Porridge. 1764 Foote Patron. i. Wks. 1799 I. 335, I never got salt to my porridge till I mounted at the Royal Exchange. 1816 Scott Old Mort. xxxvi, Hold your peace, sir,..and keep your ain breath to cool your ain porridge. 1836 Magopico 35 (E.D.D.), It's as plain as parridge that he was both a Roman and Socinian. 1883 R. Cleland Inchbracken xii. 92 If our young Captain has wance ta'en the notion, they may save their breath to cool their parritch, that would gainsay him. 1924 G. B. Shaw Saint Joan ii. 29 If you are going to say ‘Son of St Louis: gird on the sword of your ancestors, and lead us to the victory’ you may spare your breath to cool your porridge. 1930 E. Pound XXX Cantos xxii. 99 He said He would save his breath to cool his own porridge. 1969 D. Clark Nobody's Perfect iii. 79 ‘Three months sounds like generous notice.’ Hunt said soberly, ‘For a man who has made a porridge, perhaps.’ 1971 ‘H. Calvin’ Poison Chasers ii. 26 These boffins have made a porridge of this place. 1976 A. White Long Silence xi. 101, I knew I would make a porridge of explaining it. |
5. attrib. and
Comb., as
porridge basin,
porridge bowl,
porridge dish,
porridge pan,
porridge saucepan,
porridge seasoner,
porridge-supping;
porridge-coloured,
porridge-faced,
porridge-fed,
porridge-like adjs.;
† porridge-belly: see
quots.;
porridge-ice, broken ice forced into a continuous mass, pack-ice;
porridge-pot, the pot in which porridge is cooked;
porridge-stick, a stick used for stirring porridge;
porridge-time (
Sc. and
dial.), breakfast-time (or supper-time).
| 1580 Hollyband Treas. Fr. Tong, Grand potager, or mangeur de potage, a *porrige belly. 1681 W. Robertson Phraseol. Gen. (1693) 446 A huge, great,..porridge-belly Friar. |
| 1902 Farmer & Henley Slang V. 258/2 *Porridge-bowl.., the stomach. 1925 Heal & Son Catal.: Table Wares, Porridge Bowl..1/-. 1936 J. Buchan Island of Sheep ii. 25 Archie Roylance..looked up sympathetically from his porridge bowl. 1974 P. Lovesey Invitation to Dynamite Party ix. 110 A tin porridge-bowl..and a mug. 1977 ‘J. Fraser’ Hearts Ease xv. 166 You can go to that orphanage..stand in line and hold out your porridge bowl at breakfast time. |
| 1949 E. Coxhead Wind in West i. 11 Grimy *porridge-coloured upholstery. 1979 Homes & Gardens June 57/3 The village ground, with a guaranteed vicar in porridge-coloured flannels and a blacksmith in belted greys. |
| 1830 Scott Demonol. i. 45 In the case of the *porridge-fed lunatic. |
| 1880 Scribner's Mag. Jan. 331/2 The water was full of *porridge-ice. |
| 1589 R. Harvey Pl. Perc. Ded. 2 A large P. with a wide mouth like a *porradge pott. 1843 Lytton Last Bar. i. vi, Love and raw pease are two ill things in the porridge-pot. |
| 1926–7 Army & Navy Stores Catal. 150/1 Double milk or *porridge saucepan..4 pt. 9/-. 1975 C. Fremlin Long Shadow iii. 24 A porridge saucepan soaking in the sink. |
| 1895 Doyle Stark Munroe Lett. iii. (1902) 53 Always a lady, whether she was [etc.]..or stirring the porridge, which I can see her doing with the *porridge-stick in one hand. |
| 1816 Scott Old Mort. xiv, This morning about *parritch-time. |
Hence
ˈporridge v., (
a)
intr. to form porridge; (
b)
trans. to supply with porridge (
Cent. Dict. 1890); (
c) to send to prison (
slang) (
cf. porridge n. 3 c).
ˈporridgy a., resembling porridge.
| 1629 Winthrop Let. in New Eng. (1853) I. 435 Let my son Henry provide such peas as will porridge well, or else none. 1859 Atkinson Walks & Talks (1892) 356 Their damp cloud seats and porridgy mists. 1897 Allbutt's Syst. Med. III. 791 Becoming gradually thicker, till in the second week a porridgy consistency may be attained. 1965 B. Knox Taste of Proof i. 27 Jean reckoned you blokes had porridged the wrong fella when you pulled in Frank for the Glen Ault job. |