SC - porridge

[Ian van Tets]

Hello again!

Several thoughts on the porridge and fish theme:

Instead of pulverising the salt/dried fish, would people perhaps have 
soaked or stewed it and used it as a sauce on the porridge?

Barley may well have been used in the south, instead of oats, as 
Henry Best in his farming book (1641) says that barley is not used 
for the folks' (ie. the workers') puddings as the puddings run about 
the plate, but he does make reference to growing it and it must have 
had some purpose other than maslin bread.

FWIW, my grandfather (born in Blantyre, but of a good Edinburgh 
family) taught us to have pepper and butter, but no extra salt on our 
porridge.

Then there' drammoch, which apparently goes back to the 18th cent at 
least - Scots travellers (esp. by boat) put the required amount of 
oatmeal into a cloth bag, dipped it into the nearest water available, 
and ate it.  Like that - adding salt if the oats weren't dipped into 
sea water.

Cairistiona (who has just to her horror discovered that the Tudors 
had Splayds - but knew them as runcible spoons)
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