DCHP-3

rub(b)aboo

ult. < Algonk., prob. through Cdn F; cf. Ojibwa nempūp soup, broth; Cree apū soup
DCHP-1 (pre-1967)

Entry from the DCHP-1 (pre-1967)

This entry may contain outdated or offensive information, terms, and examples.

1n.

See 1964 quote.

The precise origin of this widely used term of earlier days is obscure; it may have been influenced by burgoo, used by the English traders in much the same sense.

Quotations

1821
Our Men are now eating Rababoo made of Pemican and Flour.
1863
There . . . is scarcely enough firewood to cook the snipe you shoot, or to make the "rubaboo" kettle boil. . . .
1909
There was this year plenty of buffalo meat and the Scotch women soon learned to cook it into "Rubaboo," or "Rowschow," after the manner of the French half-breeds.
1930
How he had relished that first meal at home, consisting chiefly of rubaboo and bannock buttered with buffalo marrow fat.
1964
There was the soup or stew called rubbaboo in which a lump of pemmican was chopped off and put in a pot of boiling water. If it was available, flour was added and possibly wild onions, sometimes a little sugar, occasionally a vegetable and a scrap of salt pork.
2n. — Fig.

a miscellany; a mixed bag.

Quotations

1862
I must tell now why I call these writings a Rubbaboo Journal. Any queer mixture gets that name among the voyageurs. When I try to speak French and mix English, Slavy and Louchioux words with it, they tell me "that's a rubbaboo." And when the Indians attempt to sing a voyaging song, the different keys and tunes make a "rubbaboo."
1963
Another follow-up is Rubaboo 2 (Gage) an anthology of Canadian stories and poems.