porridge

Pronunciation: /ˈpɔɹɪd͡ʒ/

Reading level: hard

Estimated CEFR level: C1 — Advanced

Estimated from word frequency; not an official CEFR classification.

Definition

  1. noun soft food made by boiling oatmeal or other meal or legumes in water or milk until thick

Etymology

Variant of pottage (“thick soup or stew”), influenced by porray (“stew of leeks”). The "prison sentence" sense comes from the British tradition of serving prisoners porridge for breakfast.

In classic literature

Semantic network

Broader (hypernyms)
dish
Narrower (hyponyms)
gruel, oatmeal, hasty pudding

A single word — an entire dictionary opens.

Type a word, a sentence, a book title, or a link to an English article. WordNet and the Classics answer.

Try

A library of classics · a vault of words · instant etymology & meaning

Continue reading

Nice save! Solidify it with review →