a bare simmer

[Barbara Need]

Thanx everyone for the feedback. I do a lot of cooking, but this was
the first time I saw this usage--and it sounded really odd to me.

Bare necessities always seemed to me to be a set phrase and not the
source for extensions. Silly me.

I looked again at the OED and this time it showed itself to me. Well,
I didn't find it.

Barbara

>At 9:28 AM -0500 8/9/04, Sally Donlon wrote:
>>The adjectival use of "bare" meaning "mere" may not be in
>>the OED, but other such uses spring to mind immediately:
>>bare minimum, bare necessity, bare facts.
>>
>>sally donlon
>
>It is in the OED.   AHD4 has
>
>4. Having no addition, adornment, or qualification: the bare facts.
>
>The OED has the following; evidently, "bare necessity" surfaces in
>Addison's "bare necessaries" (you'll have to draw in the dancing
>bear).
>
>III. Without anything of the nature of addition.
>
>11. Without addition, mere, simple;  and nothing else,  only. bare
>contract in Law: an
>unconditional promise or surrender.
>
>c1200 Moral Ode 137 in Lamb. Hom. 167 Hefde he bon er enne dei oer
>twa bare tide.
>...
>1711 ADDISON Spect. No. 69. 5 Nature indeed furnishes us with the
>bare Necessaries of Life. 1769 Junius Lett. xiii. 56 A bare
>contradiction will have no weight.
>1844 LD. BROUGHAM Brit. Const. xix. §6 (1862) 373 A bare majority of seven to
>five.
>
>>
>>
>>
>>Barbara Need wrote:
>>
>>>A recipe for a dish I made this evening asked me to "cook [the
>>>chicken] at a bare simmer". Well, I knew what was meant* but it
>>>seemed odd to me. On the other hand, Google gives me 1800 hits for
>>>the phrase!
>>>
>>>Is there anyone familiar with this use?
>>>
>>>* I suspect it is from something like "barely a simmer" or "barely
>>>simmering". The adjectival use of _bare_ meaning 'mere' is not in the
>>>OED.
>>>
>>>Barbara Need
>>>UChicago--Linguistics