I’m a big fan of breakfast. It’s a meal I never skip and one I often go to bed thinking about. Yes, I’ve made that confession on this blog before.
But in China, breakfast is a different affair – no cereals, toasts or scrambled eggs and bacon to be seen. My local Wu-Mart has a box of imported corn flakes and a whole row of oats, but that’s it in the way of cereals. Of course you can go to the western supermarkets and buy WeetBix for 55rmb (A$7.80), and they fulfill the cravings a little, but I really miss a good muesli. Back home we’d eat Carman’s, or on the lucky occasion when my mum would visit or we’d go down to Melbourne for the weekend, we’d eat her marvelous toasted muesli.
I guess everyone has their way they like to eat it. My dad and Dan like it plain with cold milk. My mum has hers with fruit. I love mine with fruit and yoghurt.
Despite there being a wide selection of muesli to buy in the western supermarkets, we’d been disappointed by too many, so when a friend lent us her toaster oven, the second thing I made (after a chicken, leek and mushroom pie) was toasted muesli, a la my mum, Kathy. It was the first time I’d ever tried making it, and despite not being able to find a few of the ingredients, it turned out delicious. It had oats, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds, sultanas, dried apricots, coconut, almonds, cashews and more…no soy grits unfortunately – I’m still looking for them. We also managed to get most of the ingredients organic, so we were really happy with what we were cooking with.
I combined everything and toasted it in batches in the toaster oven, and in 10 minutes the house smelt like my parent’s when my mum makes her muesli. I tried some and it was really good, if I do say so myself. But Dan also agreed, so we made another two or three batches. Each mouthful has crunch, plus delicious flavours and textures. Mum’s recipe really is good. I have to give the toaster oven back soon, so I’ll make another few batches to tide us over until we either buy an oven or borrow this one again! We’re also considering taking orders for this OM (Organic Muesli), so if anyone’s interested in trying some, let us know!
thehungrytravellers 