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One of the habits that has formed during the course of my 3-year weight loss Journey, has been my time in the kitchen. Before starting this journey I spent very little time in the kitchen, and for the most part my wife was the one to always prepare dinner.
But when I took ownership of my weight loss efforts I informed my wife that I was going to be very particular and somewhat selfish regarding what I ate and when I hate it. As a matter of fact, I told her at one point to stop worrying about what she was going to serve for dinner as it related to me. I felt as though that responsibility needed to rest solely in my lap so I could control it completely.
But the reality is I knew very little about what to do in the kitchen and how to do it. So yet again a new learning experience as a result of my goals of weight loss. Although my porridge is not Paleo, I like this dish as it gives me many options.
The one thing I started to experiment with was the morning meal. I never bought into the fact that breakfast is the most important part of the day
If you didn’t know breakfast being the most important part of the day is somewhat of a myth.
It was actually a marketing effort collaboration with the CEO and owner of Kellogg’s, John Harvey Kellog, and a gentleman named James Caleb Jackson.
The marketing effort was to convince citizens of the United States that breakfast was the most important meal of the day and the best way to satisfy that human need is to buy the newly invented breakfast cereal produced by Kellogg’s.
If you ever go out to breakfast in the morning anywhere in the US you will see heaping plates of sausage, bacon, eggs, bread, biscuits and gravy, French toast, fake maple syrup, and many more combinations. Most reasonable people can look at what is on people’s plates and make the fairly logical determination that most American breakfasts are not healthy.
So I started experimenting with my breakfast. Oatmeal is always the key component however I use other other types of grain for breakfast. I use bulgar wheat, quinoa, barley and brown rice most often.
The way this came about is we had, here in my house, a fair amount of unused grains in our pantry. I have never really cooked a whole lot so I felt it was fairly safe for me to follow the directions on how to make oatmeal the old-fashioned way. Then what I started doing was combining oatmeal with other things. I would combine oatmeal with couscous or rice or flaxseed or chia seeds and ust experiment.
I experimented a fair amount with those combinations. I was never really a big fan of oatmeal by itself but oatmeal with something that had a little bit more texture to it was very satisfying.
With these combinations, for the most part, I would typically after cooking the grains creation garnish them with things like blueberries or raspberries or bananas. I never really used the fruit garnishments as the core component to the porridge meal, but would use them lightly more for flavor and to leverage the nutrients that are in each of those fruits. One of the challenges though with oatmeal is it is very low in fat. And although I’m not a nutritionist I have read a fair amount that stating that a certain percentage of fat in the meal you’re consuming is actually going to enable you to process carbohydrates more efficiently. Now I’m not a nutritionist but what I do know is as I’ve experimented with these combinations I have found the weight loss and appetite to be fairly manageable.
The healthiest fats that I have found to be a very nice garnishment and compliment Papa P Porridge have been nuts. I prefer pecans and walnuts.. have found sliced almonds are the easiest garnishment for my papa porridge
In the photo of this post you will see the Papa Porridge I made today.
This dish took me about 20 minutes to prepare.
It has three tablespoons of sprouted brown rice brought to a boil, and then I add three tablespoons of old fashioned oats. I brought it to a boil for approximately 4 minutes. Then put it on low heat for approximately 8 to 10 minutes. Then removed the creation from the burner and let sit for about 15 minutes. I like to add flaxseed, others may not but it works for me. And the nice thing about flaxseed is if the prepared meal is a little bit watery the flaxseed will absorb the water.
What I do, and this is personal preference, is add real maple syrup first to the bowl so the maple syrup can melt. Then I layer on the other things. First I layer on banana, then the blueberries, and then slice almonds. This particular bowl of Pap Pporridge was a little tart. I think due to the sprouted rice. Perhaps it did not cook quite long enough. So what I did is add just a little dollop of spray whipped topping. Spray whipped topping actually is pretty low on calories and very low on sugar.
I think it came out pretty good.
I share this with you because any goal starts with the very first thing. And I believe if we can start our morning routine on the best foot forward every morning, then the rest of the day will be a lot easier to digest. And if you start your morning eating a healthy affordable meal It can set a great framework for the remainder of the day.
Papa porridge is not part of my everyday routine, but it is part of my weekly routine. And I fit in where I think it fits best. And on occasion I’ve had Papa porridge for dinner. Papa porridge will satisfy me for the majority of the day and significantly diminish hunger.
Why Papa Porridge. Well my granddaughter calls me Papa. And Papa Porridge has a nice ring.
Start with the simple things and build from there. ….Keith
