stodgy

Modifies a noun

• food: We are conditioned to associate stodgy food with comfort.
• pudding: I think all the stodgy puddings that used to be on school dinner menus are fun to try at home.
• steering: The stodgy steering also does little to inspire the driver's confidence.
• rice: How on earth do you make stodgy rice, and why would you want to when it's easier not to?
• dish: This banqueting table already creaks under the weight of such stodgy signature dishes as Iraq, personal avarice and fiscal dishonesty.

Modifying Another Word

• rather: Tony Oliver was the rather stodgy solicitor Gerald, and Keith Graham was suitably nasty as the successful businessman Beevers.
• very: To the very stodgy members of the Royal Academy, Stavans's work only serves to desecrate pure Spanish.
• too: I have had some fairly good results but nothing like my favorite kind of crispy but not too stodgy bhajees.
• somewhat: All of which makes for a somewhat stodgy read.
• quite: All of a sudden it will go quite stodgy, allow to simmer like this for a minute.
• not: The consistency should be quite thick, but not stodgy.

Used with adjective complement

• seem: Retrospectively, neon seems as stodgy as the carving on a Victorian town hall.
• feel: Somehow the bike seems to feel more stodgy than it used to - the opposite of the fun factor mentioned earlier.
• become: It does not overpower the flavor of the filling and is light enough to prevent the sandwich from becoming stodgy.