‘I don’t have rules’: cooks on making perfect porridge at home
The cookbook author Elizabeth Hewson cherishes her winter breakfast routine.She creeps downstairs before sunrise, while her husband and children are still sleeping, to make herself a bubbling pot of porridge.“It’s that small moment of peace before the day gets going,” she says.“The rhythm of standing at the stove stirring is one of those quiet rituals that I love.”She makes it with traditional oats, usually toasted dry then soaked in water overnight.
“I pour boiling water on to the oats the night before and then they’re really fluffy in the morning.It is a bit quicker to cook them in the morning and it has a creamy result as well.”Her current obsession is stirring in an egg yolk.“I think that adds a really lovely richness to it.It also leaves me feeling fuller for longer,” she says.
Sign up for the fun stuff with our rundown of must-reads, pop culture and tips for the weekend, every Saturday morningHewson salts her porridge “quite generously”, cooking it low and slow, stirring often.“We always have frozen berries in the freezer, because of the kids, so I’ll melt that down and serve on top.My favourite at the moment is stewing apples with sultanas and cinnamon.” If she has extra time, she’ll make a crumble topping or simply add granola, “like an apple crumble and custard porridge”, she says.“If we’ve got frozen cherries, I’ll pop them in a saucepan with a bit of vanilla, then pour them on top with brown sugar and cream.
”At Sydney cafe Superfreak, co-owner Michael Ico serves an oat, quinoa, buckwheat and rye porridge topped with cultured butter, brown sugar and poached rhubarb,But at home, he steers clear of dairy altogether – opting for something quick and healthy for his two children,“I’ll tend to soak oats overnight and cook them with an alternative milk, because most of my family is lactose intolerant,Then I’ll add just honey,” he says,He tops porridge with chia seeds, bananas or berries, and flaxseeds – “things that are high-fibre and good for the kids”.
“I add cinnamon or peanut butter if the kids want it,” he adds,“I don’t have rules,”Chef Toby Wilson is more of a porridge purist,He has made countless bowls of porridge with just three ingredients: oats, water and salt – because those are the only three ingredients allowed in the world porridge-making championships; he competed twice, in 2022 and 2023,He’s now the subject of Australian documentary The Golden Spurtle, which charmed audiences at the Sydney film festival this year.
“It’s funny,” he says.“It’s a fairly boring dish but its simplicity is what makes it great.Trying to master three ingredients – especially when two are salt and water – is an interesting practice.It’s a good practice to go through as a cook, professional or domestic.”Wilson uses steel-cut oats and makes his porridge with water – filtered is better than tap, he says.
He rarely adds dairy but he’ll occasionally top the oats with a sprinkle of brown sugar and a pat of butter.Crucially, he’ll always add salt.“I use sea salt, a nice healthy pinch.”For Wilson, adding fresh fruit, nuts or seeds isn’t necessary: “It’s a different dish at that point,” he says.“I’m a less-is-more guy but if you are going to add fruit I would personally move towards bananas or stewed rhubarb, rather than something watery like fresh berries.
I find those are a little sharp and watery for what should be a creamy dish,”Alice Zaslavsky is a big fan of Wilson’s method,“Thanks to Toby, we completely revolutionised the way we make our porridge,” says the cookbook author and Guardian Australia food columnist,“[My husband] Nick makes it using unstabilised oats, three parts water to one part oats, with half a teaspoon of salt flakes,It’s quite salty, because then we team it with really good French butter and brown sugar.
”She adds the butter and sugar at the table.“I quite like – and I learned this from [author] Asako Yuzuki from her book Butter – that interplay between the cold butter and the hot porridge.The key thing with the sugar is we use a soft dark brown sugar and you get the odd crunchy, molasses-y bit of brown sugar in your creamy bite of buttery porridge.”Alice and Nick treat it as a choose-your-own-adventure for their daughter, so she can add toppings such as honey, milk, muesli, granola and yoghurt.“The unstabilised oats are more nutrient dense and they have a slower release of energy,” Zaslavsky says.
“They’re also chewier and creamy without the dairy.”
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