Hardtack is the New Hotness: A Teashop Girl's Adventures in Oats

At the beginning of May, I learned I have very high cholesterol. It wasn't a total shock as I do have a family history of heart disease, but as you can imagine I was quite dismayed. I eat fairly healthfully and exercise regularly, so I was hoping for some lower numbers. But no dice. My total cholesterol is 237, which is Not Good.

Since receiving the news, I've greatly increased my consumption of oats and decreased my consumption of cheese and butter. I never did eat much red meat, so that stayed the same. I've also made an effort to add lots of "super foods" to my diet like pistachios, almonds, berries, red cabbage, pu erh tea and various other things.

Any time you try to eat any one particular food on most days, you're going to get sick of it. That's happening with me and oatmeal, so today I made oat cakes. These are super-healthy muffin-like things that I recommend for others on a heart healthy diet. I got the recipe from a cookbook but modified it quite a bit based on what I actually had in the house. Here it is:

Super Duper Dense 'n' Healthy Oat Cakes

3 cups rolled oats
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup ground or chopped walnuts
1/4 cup ground flaxseeds
3 T. molasses
3 T. melted butter or margarine
2 T. vegetable oil
1/2 cup water
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons salt
2 eggs
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon vanilla

Pre-heat oven to 325. Mix all ingredients together in a big bowl. I used my hands to mush it all together--it's definitely too heavy for a mixer. Grease a regular muffin tin and spoon generous scoops of the oat-batter in. Bake for 30 minutes. Your house will smell terrific. Makes 12 cakes. Serve warm with margarine. Eat one and you won't be hungry again for a very long time. :-)