porridge
Americannoun
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porridges
plural
noun
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a dish made from oatmeal or another cereal, cooked in water or milk to a thick consistency
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slang a term in prison (esp in the phrase do porridge )
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of porridge
1525–35; variant of earlier poddidge, akin to pottage
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How does porridge compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
Porridge is a thick, warm type of food similar to oatmeal. It's often a breakfast food. When you boil oats in milk or water, the end result of porridge. Porridge is served in a bowl and eaten with a spoon. It’s usually served for breakfast and is famous for appearing in the fairy tale of Goldilocks. Porridge is the food that's too hot, too cold, and then just right.
Vocabulary lists containing porridge
"The Tempest," Vocabulary from Acts 1 and 2
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Sideways Stories from Wayside School
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
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Tea, coffee and sugar over here; canned meat, porridge and other food over there.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 6, 2026
"The recent hiring trend has settled into that not-too-hot, not-too-cold Goldilocks porridge zone of roughly 40,000 to 60,000 jobs a month," wrote Stephen Innes at SPI Asset Management.
From Barron's ● Oct. 5, 2026
Mygal makes her a bowl of semolina porridge.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 4, 2026
She only started adding salt to her porridge ahead of the competition, but quickly realised it "really brings out the nuances and different aromas".
From BBC ● Oct. 4, 2026
She spooned porridge into her mouth, found it to be bland, and scooped four heaping mounds of brown sugar into the gray mess.
From "Throne of Glass" by Sarah J. Maas
Hygiene products like wet wipes, gels, soaps, toothpastes and porridges are also flying off the shelves in Poland, according to drugstore chain Rossmann.
From Reuters ● Mar. 16, 2022
Historically, whatever was ripe and ready was hailed in many forms: in soups and stews such as afang soup, and in porridges such as asaro and ubek, to name just a few.
From New York Times ● Nov. 8, 2021
Because polenta and grits are both cornmeal porridges, it seemed a fun and tasty way to take the Italian-Southern food connection a bit further.
From Seattle Times ● Feb. 5, 2019
Think of these porridges as soupy cousins to the more salady grain bowls that have become a staple of better-for-you cafés and fast-casual menus.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 5, 2018
Mama was always cooking up nourishing broths and porridges for forgotten old men and pale young mothers—on days, that is, when she herself was strong enough to stand at the stove.
From "The Hiding Place" by Corrie ten Boom
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
