perfect oatmeal!

don’t like mushy

okay, so maybe these are really just oats. perfect breakfast oats. best way to start my day. besides bacon and eggs, of course. i eat a lot more of these, though.

so yes…i don’t like those mushy things that i loved as a child. minute oats all gooey and full of brown sugar and milk. okay, maybe if it was cream and rapadura and a small portion, i could groove on it in the spirit of improved nostalgia. still, anything with cream and rapadura can’t be all bad, eh? except tea or coffee…keep your sweet stuff out of my tea and coffee.

and chocolate! easy on the sweets in my chocolate…and before i get back on track…anybody have a line on a milk chocolate without a lot of added sugar? just milk and chocolate with a teensy sweet?

naked oats

okay.

so it’s all about proportions. recalibration of the water oat ratio. after all…there’s not much more to oatmeal than water and rolled oats, other than a pinch of salt. everything else is just dressing.

nothing wrong with dressing, of course. after all, if we aren’t dressed we can’t get undressed, and getting undressed is certainly on a lot of top ten lists. yours, i hope! okay, enough with the digressing about undressing. and on to the oats!

the ingredients

• one cup water
• 2/3 to 3/4 cup oats
• pinch salt

a word about the ingredients. i use filtered water, organic old fashioned oats, and eden brand french celtic hand harvested sea salt. that’s just how i roll.

the process

1. place the water in a sturdy pot, fairly small, with a nice fitting lid. please find another use for all of your cheap pots.
2. add a pinch of nice salt and bring to a boil.
3. add the oats and turn the flame to low.
4. keeping an eye that they don’t boil over, simmer the oats for about 5 minutes, until the water has been absorbed.
5. dress and eat!

a word or two about dressing your oats

this is the place to let your imagination shine. i’ll tell you what i’m doing today, and then, as prince would say, you’re on your own!

• butter…2 tablespoons…as sally “half a stick” fallon would say: you can use more!
• one braeburn apple, chopped (on sale this week at whole paycheck…)
• a bit of half and half from tj’s, now that we are talking about it
• a nice sized dollop of 7 stars biodynamic yogurt
• a handful of pumpkin seeds

there you go

so this much oats will feed me if i’ve got a long way to go for lunch, and it will feed me and rowan, the 3.75 year old, if i am feeling generous. enjoy your oats, naked or dressed, and feel free to chime in on your own favorite preparation and wardrobe choices for avena sativa, the common, and ever so stylish, oat!