Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (also stodge, stodgie, stodgy) a dull, spiritless person; thus stodgery, the manner in which such a person behaves.

1818		Northampton Mercury 29 Aug. 1/1: They met with another person [...] whose nickname was ‘Stodger’.
1883		‘’Arry on His Critics & Champions’ Punch 14 Apr. 180/1: We smart ’uns must put on the pace, [...] and if in the run / We bump or bowl over the stodgies, wy, that’s more than arf of the fun.
1891		‘’Arry on Wheels’ Punch 7 May 217/2: Old maids, retired gents, sickly jossers, and studyus old stodges live there.
1907		Punch 25 Jan. 62/1: The other regular old stodgers who go to all the parties within a radius of six miles.
1920		W. Deeping Second Youth 31: If you were starving, Miles, I suppose you would walk down Oxford Street and say nothing. What stodgery! We middle-class people are hopeless!
1957		J.M. Hosking ‘People of Aus.’ Aus. First and Last 93: New South Wales girls are like honey [...] There are widgies there and bodgies, / But you won’t find many ‘stodgies’.

2. an old-fashioned person.

1889

W. Sickert N.Y. Herald 18 Mar. 5: The ‘stodger,’ as you call him [...] is frequently an artist of refinement.

3. a glutton.

1907		Sun. Times (Perth) 20 Oct. 5/7: He eats — spare me days, how he eats! / He’s never a half-and-half stodger.
1984		Partridge DSUE (8th edn) 1158/2: late C.19–20.

4. (US) a cook with slovenly habits.

1910

‘Word-List From West Brattleboro’ in DN III:vi 455: sto(d)ger, n. A cook with slovenly habits.