Pease Pudding Hot

History & Origin

"Pease Pudding Hot" is a short, vivid rhyme about one of the staple dishes of pre-industrial England. Pease pudding — a thick, filling paste made from dried split peas, boiled in a cloth — was a common food for working people from the medieval period well into the nineteenth century. It was cheap, filling, and could be made in quantity and eaten over several days.

The rhyme was first recorded in print in the mid-eighteenth century, though it is likely older. The notion of eating something nine days old reflects a world without refrigeration, where preserved and stored foods were a necessity rather than a novelty. "Pease pudding cold" is a real thing: the dish firms up as it cools and was eaten sliced, much like a loaf.

The contrast between "some like it hot" and "some like it cold" gives the rhyme a comic even-handedness — there is apparently no wrong way to eat pease pudding, as long as you eat it. The rhyme has survived long after the dish itself faded from everyday English life, which is perhaps the most fitting tribute to both.