Castles of Porridge

File under Myths and Legends: Given it's robust texture and inherent physical strength I'm surprised that Scottish engineers have never managed to successfully develop porridge as a usable building material. My sources have however confirmed that in Victorian times a team from Edinburgh University looked into it's use as a medium to build cheap workers homes at the new Naval Base at nearby Rosyth. Tests were carried out but there were "complications". Allegedly some locals entered the site and ate parts of critical load bearing units, a number of serious injuries as well as digestive problems were reported at the time.

This apparent failure may yet have led on to the rumoured experimental Forth Railway Crossing project that was to combine iron, steel and porridge in what would have been an engineering world's first (pretty exceptional anyway). Little is known about how far the testing and design works got before the plan was shelved due to what were described at the time as "conflicts of ideology" within the team. Clearly the times and the science were not right for such an undertaking.

I also believe that in the 1950s there was a proposal from a cartel of Fife landowners and farmers that the new Scottish motorway system should use porridge as an experimental road finish. They undertook to supply the oats and the know how. There are no records as to how this venture ended however there are known to be stretches of the A90 that are still thought of as legacy porridge surface testing areas by BEAR Scotland.

Of course there's the long standing legend that tells of how William Wallace, had he survived English captivity, intended to build a massive porridge castle on the banks of Loch Lomond to hold the proposed garrison that would have protected the "Road to the Isles". It would also have formed his military HQ and be the  seat of his Scottish Government. We can only speculate as to the porridge formula he intended to use, as the recipe and the exact strain of wild oats has been lost due the passage of time and the general illiteracy of the engineers in the 13th century. 

The proposed design for the world's first porridge castle situated near Balloch, to have been built by William Wallace. Note the hot porridge moat - a first even for Scotland: courtesy the Scottish National Museum of Oat Based Antiquities. Part of the "Lofty Peak" Family Collection.