Buy the Good Oatmeal

Why daily indulgences matter

Hello, Gorgeous!

I’ve just spent the better part of the past hour scraping congealed steel cut oatmeal goo off my counters. And stove. And cabinets. And the floor. You get the idea…

This morning I was too lazy to take out my overlarge for one Instant Pot and too hungry to wait for my tiny (extremely) slow cooker to work. And so I used the $32 Aroma Rice Cooker I once reviewed for an article. It works in a pinch (or in a dorm room), but is no friend to oatmeal. You know what else I cheaped out on? The oatmeal itself. I was feeling very virtuous and bought Aldi steel cut oats instead of my usual brand. I will regret that purchase until my dying day. Okay, not literally, but the Aldi oats were bad. Very bad. And for an item that brings me so much breakfast joy, the $2 savings overall didn’t add up.

If steel cut oats aren’t part of your day-to-day life, you might be missing the fact that they take a lot of coaxing to cook the perfect batch. Usually it works out just fine. And usually, I buy …