October Unprocessed...or Not

Sure, we can do a month of unprocessed cooking! The October Unprocessed Challenge sounds perfect!

Or not.

Confession time, folks: while we usually DO cook a lot of unprocessed foods--or at least bake from scratch--this October was not a cooking-conducive month. We were out of town and/or busy with visitors EVERY weekend this month. We had a heap of extra commitments on top of that (including a birthday). In fact, the first night of October, do you know what I fed my kids? Um, boxed mac-n-cheese. Not a glorious start.

But, I must say, thanks to those lovely coupons from Bob's Red Mill that I got when I signed up for the challenge, we have discovered some delicious new breakfast options to round out our boring oatmeal rut: Scottish Oats (the Bob's Red Mill ones are like chopped steel cut oats--steel cut, but not as "big" as normal steel cut oats; my kids like the texture much better). Brown Rice "Cream of Wheat" (Bob's Red Mill calls theirs "farina" or something like that, but it's very similar to my childhood fave--Cream of Wheat). Neither of these options are as cheap as our usual old-fashioned oats, but they are delicious and a wonderful change of pace. There is also a multi-grain porridge which is a yummy taste change-of-pace. I guess we learned some new things after all. My breakfast rotation might have porridge on several mornings--and they'll all be a little different!

All images from Bob's Red Mill website