Breakfast Lab: Savory Oatmeal
I never ate oatmeal growing up. I tried it once, along with cream of wheat, and could never wrap my taste buds around the texture, or the my eyes, for that matter. It just never looked all that appealing to me. And since my mother wasn’t a hot cereal person herself, I wasn’t forced to eat it.
It wasn’t until very recently, about three years ago, that a friend mentioned that she’d mixed some leftover greens into a fresh batch of steel-cut oats and that piqued my interested. Almost everyone I knew that ate oatmeal ate it sweet, and the idea that it could be anything but sweet never occurred to me. But it is a grain, after all, and just like you can have sweet rice dishes and rice pudding, you can have savory oatmeal.
So I decided to give it a try, and I’ve been hooked ever since.
Savory oatmeal with leafy greens is on my list of official comfort foods. It’s a great way to use up leftover greens and enjoy a simple meal that will keep you satisfied for a good part of the morning.
Ingredients
½ cup steel-cut oats, soaked overnight in water or vegetable stock
1 cup leftover leafy greens
Your favorite seasonings, to taste, optional
Salt and pepper, to taste
Steel-cut oats can take up to an hour to cook completely, so if you soak them overnight you can cut down the cooking time to about 20 minutes. If I don’t have vegetable stock on hand, I’ll sometimes throw a small amount of vegetable bouillon into the water while it’s cooking for extra flavor.
Prepare the steel cut oats according to package directions. In the last ten minutes of cooking, fold in your leftover greens and let simmer until the greens are heated through and the oats are cooked thoroughly. Add seasonings if using, and a little extra water or stock, if necessary.
Breakfast: Eat It!
People skip breakfast either because of poor time management or a misguided attempt at weight loss, but what you eat (or don’t) at the top of the morning will determine how you’ll function throughout the day.
The word itself is an indication of what you need to be doing – breaking the fast – (abstaining from eating) of the past several hours you spent asleep plus the couple of hours after your last meal before bedtime (hopefully, you put space between your last meal and bedtime).
When you skip breakfast, several things begin to happen. First, your body will begin to slow down your metabolism and hold on to the energy (calories) it should be using for everyday functions, like keeping you awake and breathing, walking and talking, and cognitive tasks. Next, you’ll be tempted to make poor food choices by the time you do finally get around to eating. You’ll be so hungry that you’ll just reach for the nearest and most convenient option to sate your hunger. You also risk overeating by eating more than you usually would if you’d had breakfast, because of that overwhelming hunger and as a way to compensate for missing that first meal.
But not all breakfasts are created equal, so even though any breakfast is better than no breakfast at all, think about how you relate to breakfast and what kinds of foods make you feel good and alive in the morning.
Which foods generally have you feeling your best and hold you over til midday? Is it enough for you to have a bowl of cereal or a bagel, or do you need to have some kind of protein and veggies? Will a fruit smoothie satisfy you or would you prefer to start your day with a bowl of oatmeal? How about soup? Do you ever eat dinner leftovers for breakfast?
Maybe you’re a “two breakfast” kind of person who needs to start off with something light before heading off to work or school and having something more substantial when you’re at your destination.
There are food experts (and food fanatics) that can write for days about which foods are best for the first meal of the day, but it’s really up to you to experiment and see what kinds of foods in which combinations will get you through to lunchtime without cravings, snacking, and or food-related mood swings.
Just be mindful to watch the amount of sugar and/or caffeine you consume first thing, as the initial energy spike could have you crashing by lunchtime.
What do you eat for breakfast and how has that been working for you?
How To Avoid the Transition Trap
The easiest way to find out how much you think you know about something is to teach it to someone else. The easiest way to discover the truth about your relationship with food is to experience living without it.
Transitioning to a plant-based diet will open you up to a wide variety of sensory experiences across colors, flavors, smells, and textures, but it’s easy to get stuck on transition foods due to convenience, access, and limited knowledge of cooking and ingredients.
The transition trap consists of relying heavily on plant-based foods shared by omnivores and vegetarians alike, simple carbs like white rice, bread, French fries, and pasta, convenience foods like pizza, veggie burgers, and tofu dogs, and the need to have everything resemble its animal-derived counterpart (nondairy milks, cheese, tofu, seitan, and analogues that attempt to replicate the texture and taste of cheese, meat, poultry, and fish).
Yes, being able to hold on to familiar foods keeps us connected socially and culturally, but one of the reasons many of us transition to a plant-based diet is to embrace a more health-supportive relationship with the foods we eat. And just because a food is plant-based or doesn’t contain animal-sourced ingredients does not make it healthier or better.
Many foods marketed as “vegetarian” or “vegan” are highly processed, and often contain ingredients that are just as sketchy and unrecognizable as you may find in popular mainstream foods. It’s irrational to assume that just because you’re not consuming animal-derived foods that your diet is healthier, especially if you’re mirroring the Standard American Diet (SAD) of highly processed, chemicalized, artificial junk foods.
So how do you know if you’re stuck in the transition trap?
If you’re not incorporating several servings of raw and cooked vegetables, whole grains, and legumes into your daily meals, and the aforementioned simple carbs, mock meats and other processed foods present themselves at each meal, you’re in the transition trap.
Here are five ways to avoid the transition trap and move towards a more health-supportive and varied plant-based diet:
Learn to cook
Chances are you’re an adult reading this, and part of being an adult is taking responsibility for your life and what happens to it. Not knowing how to cook is a poor excuse for not eating well. Look for a personal chef for private lessons, or check the community college, cooking school, YMCA, or wellness center in your area for classes on how to boil water (yes, there are classes with this title), use knives safely, saute, roast, make soups, salads, bake, and everything else. Or, if you have a good friend or two that really know how to throw down, offer to buy groceries in exchange for a few tips on how to navigate a kitchen and put together a good meal.
Plan your meals
You probably have a mental recipe index of about ten to fifteen recipes you rotate in and around meals that are quick/ready to eat or dining/takeout. Browse for plant-based recipes on sites like 101Cookbooks, Vegetarian Times, Post Punk Kitchen, and Happy Herbivore for recipes that take less than an hour to prepare. Once you have about fifteen, let these be your go-to recipes and plan out your meals (what to eat on which days, grocery lists, leftover recreations, etc) for the week.
Eat whole foods
When you eat whole foods that are minimally processed, you have more control over what’s in them, even when you indulge in the occasional treat. And since whole foods have all of their nutrients intact, you’ll be less likely to overeat, which is one of the ways your body tries to get what it needs when it’s not getting enough of the good stuff.
Eat the rainbow
No, I’m not talking about those round, artificially colored and flavored candies, but the wide variety of colorful vegetables and fruits that make plant-based diets vibrant and exciting. Those colors indicate specific phytonutrients and anti-oxidants, so eat them often raw, cooked, juiced, and blended.
Expand your palate
If you’ve been eating the same types of meals your entire life and your plant-based diet reflects that, it’s time you got out more. Beyond your standard American fare, you can find a bounty of delicious plant-based meals and cuisines throughout Latin and South America, Africa, and Asia.
Are you currently in the transition trap?
What are some of the foods you default to?
What could you be doing more of to expand your options and eat a diverse variety of plant foods?
