Saturday, January 26, 2008

Fancy Scratch Grains

We've been eating a lot of oatmeal this winter because we are unable to get eggs (the farm we were getting them from doesn't sell them in the winter due to low production and our hens aren't laying yet) and I have to pay too much for milk right now to make yogurt. We will occasionally eat a breakfast of fruit and toast or pancakes or waffles, but these don't fill us up like oatmeal. Anyway, it is our first real brush with eating seasonally and though I enjoy it, it does present a challenge. How does one make meals interesting when your choices are limited?

Well, I attempted to meet that challenge by incorporating other grains into the oatmeal. Since I have a grain mill and crack my own oats (my version of steel-cut), I can easily throw in another grain. My first experiment was adding some barley. No one even noticed. Which in some ways is good...at least they didn't reject it! I decided, however, that I was going to make them notice next time. So, my next experiment was to add spelt, kamut, barley, millet, and flax seeds to the oats. This, they noticed. In fact, Caleb said it looked just like the fancy scratch grains we feed the chickens.

1 comment:

Rachel said...

That's a funny comparison! Did he eat it?

I add milled flax seed and wheat germ to my oatmeal, along with some frozen wild blueberries and honey. It's delicious and my favorite winter breakfast.