Water Gruel
Ingredients
Directions
Make the gruel
Bring 1 pint of water to a boil in a saucepan.
In a bowl, mix 1 tablespoon of oatmeal with a little cold water until smooth.
Stir the oatmeal mixture into the boiling water.
Let it boil for 10 minutes.
Optional creamier version
For a creamier version, substitute water with milk.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
Explore the science
What each ingredient does
- Oatmeal
- Thickens the water into a gruel as its starch swells during boiling.
- Water
- Serves as the cooking liquid that hydrates the oatmeal and carries its flavour.
The step that matters
Mixing the oatmeal smooth before stirring it in. Dry oatmeal clumps when added straight to hot liquid because its outer starch gelatinises quickly. Blending it first with cold water spreads the particles out, so they hydrate evenly and the gruel stays smooth.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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