Definition

1. Noun:
   • A soft, thick, warm food made by boiling ground, crushed, or chopped cereal grains (especially oats) or legumes in water or milk until they absorb the liquid and become soft and mushy.

Examples

• Noun:
  • For breakfast, I often eat a bowl of hot porridge.
  • Oat porridge is a traditional and healthy meal.
  • The patient was given a simple porridge because it was easy to digest.

Advanced Usage

• "to do porridge" (British English slang): to serve a prison sentence.
  • He's doing porridge for armed robbery.
• "to keep one's breath to cool one's porridge" (Idiom, old-fashioned): to save one's advice or opinion for oneself, as it will not be heeded by others. (Implies one should mind one's own business.)

Variants and Related Words

• Congee (n): A type of rice porridge common in many Asian cuisines.
• Gruel (n): A thinner, more liquid form of porridge, often associated with basic sustenance or historical poverty.
• Oatmeal (n): Can refer to the raw oats used to make porridge or to the cooked porridge dish itself, especially in North American English.

Synonyms

• Mush (n, chiefly North American): A soft, thick, shapeless mass of food, especially porridge.
• Pap (n, dated or regional): Soft, bland food such as porridge, especially for infants or invalids.

Related Phrases

• Porridge oats (n): The specific type of oats processed for making porridge.
• Porridge pot (n): A pot used for cooking porridge.

Related Idioms

• "Save your breath to cool your porridge": A variant of "keep one's breath to cool one's porridge," meaning don't waste your words giving unwanted advice.

Noun

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