mmm Gruel

Yes, I admit it, musical theater is sometimes referenced in my daily life.  When you work in food service, it's only natural that you quote "Oliver!" around staff-meal time.  The question then becomes, "What, exactly, is gruel?" (we all know better than to ask for more).

http://royceferguson.blogspot.com/2011/05/porridge-gruel-grits-and-lawyers.html

The basic recipe for gruel consists of grain boiled in water or milk.  Grains used commonly for these recipes include: oats, wheat, rye, rice, millet, hemp, and barley.  Chestnut and acorn flour (though from those rare, less tannic, oak trees) have also been used in especially hard times.  "Gruel" is a catchall term in English, which can be used to describe foods from across the globe, from the English dish (typically made with oats) to Korean Jat-juk (pine-nut and rice) to Mesoamerican Atole (maize, chili, and salt). 
    Gruel was a staple in the diet of the Medieval peasant.  Meat was extremely expensive (even when animals were the source of your income), so most meals consisted of grains and vegetables (and fish, depending on where you lived).  When preparing, these grains could be roasted and ground roughly at home, avoiding the added cost of using the mill.  It was easily digestible, so commonly prescribed for invalids and freshly weaned children.  For those living outside of a town, ovens were not generally available for the baking of bread (remember, in many places, ovens were a luxury used by the whole community), so gruel was a way to get the calories into those bellies. 
    Try to think of it this way, gruel doesn't have to be a terrible thing.  It has gotten a bad name thanks to a variety of literary sources (as in my association).  Even in Medieval times they were making upscale versions.  Gruya (14th C France)  is a version made from barley and almond milk, with sugar and salt thrown in.  Mmmm luxury.  Gruel is essentially a base, like the basic recipe for any soup.  It can be as savory or sweet as you like.  Wiki suggests that Ovaltine is essentially a gruel.  Now go out there and give some a try.  Quit being such a snob and believing everything you read.  Didn't we just talk about that?
   



definition -http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gruel
wiki - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gruel
competent source - http://www.mrbreakfast.com/ask.asp?askid=10
recipes - http://www.medievalplus.com/food-cooking/recipes-gruel.html