Porridge for dinner
Oddly satisfying.
This month has felt like a holding pattern – decisions have gone unmade, tasks unfulfilled. Nothing has felt very certain. I’ve found myself avoiding posting anything on social media, because none of it feels true. Instead, I’ve been busying myself with other distractions: sewing, which is new, and cooking, which is not. It’s been so cold lately that some mornings I can see my breath fogging the air as I wait for the kettle to boil in my tiny kitchen. I wear a coat and a scarf inside. The cats are furious and spend all day staring at me, as if waiting for me to correct the error in temperature.
On a cold, dismal night, I cast around for something that would comfort me. My pantry was depleted. The avocados were not yet ripe. There were no herbs in the fridge to dress up a bowl of pasta, no eggs to poach and eat with hot toast.
What I did have was a jar of oats.
Porridge is a similar proposition to dhal, or risotto, or congee – cheap to make, takes little more than some patient stirring, and is a convenient vehicle for whatever flavouring you like. The way I’ve grown up, porridge is usually eaten sweet – with honey, or stewed fruit – but it can be savoury just as easily (see Hetty McKinnon’s miso oats with eggs and avocado, for example). Some people eat it flavoured with little more than salt, which has a kind of stoic, spartan appeal. It’s filling enough to count as dinner, though it’s rarely eaten as such.
I had half a jar of plum jam in the fridge, a gift from my aunt in Sydney and a reminder of a summer long past (its colour a lovely warm amber; like Plath’s “cat’s eyes in the wine cellar”). But the weather called for something darker and deeper. Inspired by an old-fashioned recipe for gingerbread, I made a porridge enriched with black treacle – satisfying enough for dinner, but perfectly appropriate for breakfast too.
Now, on with the recipe…
Black Treacle Porridge
Serves one, multiply as necessary.
Ingredients:
1/2 cup of raw oats
1/2 cup of milk
1/2 cup of water
A pinch of salt
A heaped teaspoon of brown sugar
A tablespoon-ish of black treacle
Take the raw oats and put them in a saucepan over medium heat. Add the water and milk (I used soy), plus a pinch of salt. Give it a stir now and then as it warms, and when it starts to boil, reduce it to a simmer. Spoon in your brown sugar, then add a tablespoon (or more) or black treacle/molasses. The porridge will turn a caramel-like shade. When it has reached a creamy consistency, remove it from the heat and tip it into your favourite bowl. It will be sweet and rich and comforting.
Good things to read
On Jumbo’s ghost: a spectral journey through strange and melancholy collisions between elephant and machine — in nineteenth century history, adventure novels, abandoned roadside hotels, and psychic science. – via the Public Domain Review
I’m always a fan of what Durga Chew-Bose writes, and this essay on flowers in film is even more calibrated to my interests than normal. It’s instantly joined my personal canon of flower-writing, along with this piece by Alexander Chee and Leá Antigny’s lovely newsletter. – via This Long Century
Helena Betya Rubinstein unpacks memory, forgetting and Sebald’s “melancholic ellipsis” in Against Impossibility. (Also worth a read: this critique.) – via Jewish Currents
In case of interest
This month I have a piece in the print issue of Australian Gourmet Traveller on the history of chilli – a fun piece to research as well as an opportunity to interview chef Tony Tan. Tan gave a genial, generous and incredibly humble interview, and followed up by texting me photos of the chillies he was growing in his greenhouse. A true gentleman!
One more thing!
This might be my favourite porridge-related story in a long time.