[3] Pottage was typically boiled for several hours until the entire mixture took on a homogeneous texture and flavour; this was intended to break down complex starches and to ensure the food was safe for consumption.

This incident is the origin of the phrase a "mess of pottage" (which is not in any Biblical text) to mean a bad bargain involving short-term gain and long-term loss.

In Middle English, thick pottages (stondyng) made with cereals, kidneys, shredded meat, sometimes thickened with egg yolks and bread crumbs were called by various names like brewet, egerdouce, mortrew, mawmenee, blancmange and blance dessore.

[5] The earliest known cookery manuscript in the English language, The Forme of Cury, written by the court chefs of King Richard II,[6] contains several pottage recipes including one made from cabbage, ham, onions and leeks.

[8] During the Tudor period, a good many English peasants' diets consisted almost solely of pottage and self-cultivated vegetables, such as carrots.

[4] Potage was a common dish in the medieval cuisine of northern France, and it increased in popularity from the High Middle Ages onward.

The word "potage" as a culinary term appears as early as the mid-13th century, describing a wide variety of boiled and simmered foods.

Other vegetables in potages on lean days were of a finer quality of the sort served as entremets or Lenten entrées, including cauliflower, spinach, artichokes, cardoons, chard, celery, Paris mushrooms, and skirrets.

[23] Native American cuisine also had a similar dish, but it was made with maize rather than the traditional European grain varieties.

[25] A version of "scotch barley broth" is attested to in the 18th century colonial recipe collection called Mrs Gardiner's Family Receipts.

[27] According to Spanish cuisine religious customs, if a festa doble (a "double feast" in the church) fell on a meat day two consecutive potaje courses were served, one of which would be a cheese-topped rice or noodle dish, the other a meat stew (Catalan: guisat) cooked in "salsa" made from wine, vinegar, parsley, spleen, liver, saffron, egg yolks and assorted spices.

Two potaje courses were also served for fish days, first high-quality spinach from the monastery gardens topped with peppers, or cabbage or lettuce (if spinach could not be found), followed by either a bowl of semolina or noodles or rice cooked in almond milk, or a grain bowl of semolina groats seasoned with cinnamon.

[29] This is similar to the Welsh cawl, which is a broth, soup or stew often cooked on and off for days at a time over the fire in a traditional inglenook, containing ingredients such as potatoes and leek.