This was served as the opening dish of the first course at the Ymir 2023 feast.
Introduction
A thick, warming oat pottage was the natural choice to open a February feast. As the first dish of the first course, it filled the “gross food” role explicitly — hearty, filling, inexpensive — and it had a practical advantage: oats hold heat well from pot to serving bowl to hall, which mattered when the diners had just come in from the cold. The dish is adapted from Markham’s ordinary pottage, which is a meat-based recipe; I made it meatless, relying on butter and onions for richness in place of the mutton broth.
Source
Gervase Markham, The English Housewife (1615)
It resteth now that we speake of boild meates and broths, which for asmuch as our Hous-wife is intended to be generall, one that can as well feed the poore as the rich, we will first begin with those ordinary wholesom boyld meates, which are of vse in euery good mans house: therefore to make the best ordinary Pottage, you shall take a racke of Mutton cut into pieces, or a leg of Mutton cut into pieces; for this meate and these ioynts are the best, although any other ioynt, or any fresh Beefe will likewise make good Pottage: and hauing washt your meate well, put it into a cleane pot with faire water, & set it on the fire; then take Violet leaues, Succory, Strawberry leaues, Spinage, Langdebeefe, Marigola flowers, Scallions, and a little Parsly, and chop them very small together, then take halfe so much oat-meale well beaten as there is Hearbs, and mixe it with the Hearbs, and chop all very well together: then when the pot is ready to boyle, skum it very well, and then put in your hearbs, and so let it boyle with a quicke fire, stirring the meate oft in the pot, till the meate be boyld enough, and that the hearbs and water are mixt together without any separation, which will be after the consumption of more then a third part: Then season them with Salt, and serue them vp with the meate either with Sippets or without.
Discussion
- The most significant adaptation is making this meatless. Markham’s pottage is built on mutton or beef simmered in the broth; I replaced the meat fat and richness with generous butter and caramelized onions, which approximates the mouthfeel of a meat-based broth reasonably well. The result is a different dish but recognizably the same type of pottage — I think a medieval diner would know what they were eating.
- Markham specifies a long list of fresh herbs — violet leaves, succory, strawberry leaves, spinach, langdebeef, marigold flowers, scallions, and parsley — many of which are simply not available or not available in February. I used sage instead, which is a purely personal choice but one that pairs well with the oats and onions.
- I used steel-cut oats rather than the “oat-meale well beaten” of the original. Markham’s beaten oatmeal mixed with herbs would have produced a much smoother, more porridge-like texture — essentially a thick gravy, which makes sense when it’s surrounding pieces of mutton and potentially served with sippets of toast. As a standalone vegetarian dish, I thought the more distinct texture of steel-cut oats would be more enjoyable for diners.
- The oats were soaked thoroughly before cooking, which is another departure from the original method. This made the actual porridge-making much faster at scale and significantly reduced the risk of scorching — an important consideration when you’re working with large pots.
- Frozen spinach was a practical substitution for the same seasonal-availability reasons as the herbs. For dishes where the spinach is going to be cooked down, the difference between frozen and fresh in the final result is virtually nil, and it saves considerable labor in washing, stemming, and chopping.
- This was not one of the more remarked-upon dishes of the feast, which is about right. It did its job as a warm, filling opener.
Oat and Spinach Pottage
A meatless adaptation of Markham’s ordinary pottage — steel-cut oats cooked with caramelized onions, sage, and spinach, finished with butter.
Ingredients
2 c steel-cut oats
2 medium onions, diced
1 lb frozen spinach, thawed
4 oz (1 stick) butter, divided
1 tsp dried sage (or 1 tbsp fresh, chopped)
1 tbsp minced garlic
Salt and pepper, to taste
Extra butter and cracked pepper, for serving
Directions
- Soak oats in their cooking pot with 4 parts water to 1 part oats; leave for several hours or overnight.
- In a separate pan, caramelize the onions in half the butter over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally. When nearly done, add the minced garlic and sage, and cook another minute or two.
- Stir the caramelized onions (and their butter) into the oats. Add the remaining butter if needed.
- Bring the oats to a boil, then reduce heat to as low as possible.
- Cook, stirring often and scraping the bottom, until the oats are tender (5–10 minutes). Add more water if the mixture tightens up too much.
- Stir in the spinach and cook until heated through, about 10 minutes.
- Season generously with salt and pepper. Serve with an extra pat of butter and cracked pepper on top.
