When a dog’s breakfast is what’s for dinner
Last time, I challenged you to come up with a “family word for ‘the dish or meal that results from combining odds and ends that you happen to have in the fridge, usually a forgettable concoction.’” Many readers asserted, with varying degrees of accuracy, that a term for this is already in general use. Lloyd Sutfin, of Puerto Rico and Portsmouth, N.H., said: “It’s had a name for years. Burgoo!”
Jeff Kaufman, of Needham, reported: “Of course, with well-established usage, that is hodgepodge. By the way, in a traditional Dutch restaurant in Amsterdam, I had hodgepodge, and it was excellent.”
Mardi Fish wrote: “There is a word for this dish of leftover meat, vegetables, and potatoes, usually in gravy. My frugal mother made it all the time, different every time, for five kids born in six years in the 1950s. The word is glop.”
Bob Gaughan, of Weston, said the term is dog’s breakfast. Ed Costello, of Lexington, said it’s slop gullion. Mary F. McCabe said it’s slumgullion. Steve Watson, of Lynnfield, wrote: “Liverpudlians use a dialect known as Scouse. They are called scousers, and their leftovers stew is also called scouse.”
Other readers did share family words — or phrases. Dave Brown told me: “My wife and I offer Aunt Matilda’s Saturday Night Casserole. Back in the mid-1970s, Steve’s Ice Cream in Davis Square was all the rage. We would occasionally drive in to Somerville from Andover for a cone, joining the line that snaked around the inside of the store and down the block. On the wall were signs describing the day’s offerings, and one night a flavor was Aunt Matilda’s Saturday Night Casserole, described as a mash-up of all the other flavors left over at the end of the day. The description concluded with ‘We won’t be making this flavor again.’” A good tale, Dave, and thanks for it.
More than a few readers expressed pride in the concoctions they make. Glenn Goldman, of Bellingham, reported: “One of my favorite culinary tasks is to take a bunch of leftovers and combine them to make something better than the originals. I call them liftovers.” Patti Vangsness, of Medway, said: “We call those meals rightunders!”
Josh Jacobson, of Newton, wrote: “We love putting together various leftover soups and making Frankensoup. This name is derived from what some choral conductors do, putting together a mass (the musical kind) from a movement in each of five different mass settings, creating a FrankenMass.”
But a few readers expressed something more like shame. John Foster, of Lynn, proposed regredible, defining it as “a dish made from leftovers that you wish you’d never made.”
Ed De Vos, of Newton, came up with potyuck dinner.
The most common family word I received, from Leslie Harris, of Hull; Wilma Kassakian, of Newton; Stephen Krom; Dale McCalla, formerly of Manchester-by-the-Sea; Carole O’Connor, of Tuftonboro, N.H.; Ann Shildneck, of Arlington; and Jo Sullivan, of Lynn, was musgo or mustgo — or must go.
Two readers proposed the word I liked best. “I think a proper word for a mélange of leftovers would be rehash,” wrote Rosalie Kaufman, of Swampscott. John Mahoney, of Hanson, seconded her: “Of course it should be rehash.” Well done, you two! I hereby award both of you bragging rights.
Now Marc L. Cooper, of Westport, writes: “I’m looking for a word for an umbrella that is blown inside out in a strong windy rain. I used to use the word flooped, which sounded perfect to me, but I’ve learned since that it has other meanings.”
I’ll take a noun for the umbrella, an adjective for the umbrella’s condition, or a verb describing what it did when it turned inside out.
Send your suggestions to me at Barbara.Wallraff@globe.com by noon on Friday, June 30, and kindly tell me where you live. Responses may be edited. Also, please remember that meanings in search of words are always welcome.
Barbara Wallraff is a writer and editor in Cambridge.