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Home » Kitchenware » Griddles » Girdle

Girdle

Iron girdle

Iron girdle. Collection of Auckland Museum Tamaki Paenga Hira. wikimedia / 2015 / Auckland Museum CCBY.

A girdle is like a griddle, in that it is a flat cooking surface, but instead of being set on top of the heat source, it is hung over the heat source by a long, linked metal chain.

It is usually made of iron, and usually round, with a metal hooped handle that a chain to hang it with will attach to.

A girdle was used for “baking” items such as bannock, scones, oatcakes, and other quick breads. You cook the items on it, as you would a pancake.

It was used particularly in Scotland.

A maker of one was called either a “Girdilmaker”, “Girdler” or “Girdlesmith.”

Literature & Lore

“Wi’ butter’d bannocks now the girdle reeks…” — Robert Fergusson (1750-1774)

“like a hen on a het girdle” meant hopping from one foot to another.

“The Bailie . . . had all this while shifted from one foot to another with great impatience, “like a hen”, as he afterwards said, “upon a het girdle.” — Sir Walter Scott. Waverley Novels. 1814.

Sources

Girdle: In: Dictionary of the Scots Language. Scottish Language Dictionaries. Accessed October 2019 at https://www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/snd/girdle

Iron girdle

A girdle from Dalgarven Mill in North Ayrshire, Scotland. Rosser1954 / wikimedia / 2007 / Public Domain

 

This page first published: Jan 16, 2006 · Updated: May 21, 2022.

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Tagged With: Cookware, Scottish Food

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