Welcome to the very first edition of “What Is She Eating?” Wednesday!  I bet you have some questions, so let me see if I can’t answer them for you…

Q:  What the heck is “What Is She Eating?” Wednesday?
A:  Basically, it’s my way of inviting you over for breakfast, lunch, dinner, or even a snack.  So pull up a chair and get ready to chow down!

Q:  Huh?
A:  Okay, sorry, let me try to explain that another way… I like whole grains, so I eat them often and in many different forms.  Yes, I know, we all know I’m a habitual oatmeal-for-breakfast kind of girl, but I do eat whole grains in many other forms, and since I can’t physically invite you all to join me as I explore tasty whole grain recipes (like the plethora of recipes on our website), I thought it might be fun to share my adventures with you via the WGC blog.

Q:  Okay, now I get it, but why recipes?  Why not just show us the whole grain things your eating, even if it is just a mug of instant oatmeal for breakfast?
A:  First off, wouldn’t that get a little boring for you?  “Oh she’s eating oatmeal.  Again.  Yawn!”  Yeah, I’d stop reading too.  Second, cooking is fun!  Yes, some recipes take ingredients that you may not have immediately on hand in your pantry, but to me that’s part of the appeal.  Some recipes take a little advance planning or prep work, but there’s something soothing about chopping and dicing and mixing.  And hey, you can always read a few pages in a good book and put a load of laundry in while you’re waiting for that stick of butter to soften properly!  Third, cooking and sharing with you will help me from falling into my old familiar food ruts.  You know what I’m talking about, those days and weeks at a stretch where you eat the same thing over and over again…  Sometimes (like my oatmeal habit) food ruts are practical and beneficial, but more often it seems to me that food ruts serve as limitations.  They erect boundaries and walls in our minds without us truly being aware there’s construction going on.  Should you try that new recipe that your friend swears is fast and easy, or should you just have cold cereal for dinner again?  Yeah, food ruts…  We all fall into them, so maybe sharing whole grain cooking adventures here can encourage us all to shake things up from time to time.

Fourth and finally, we at the WGC sometimes field consumer’s questions that make me realize people are still a little confused about using whole grains in recipes.  I can see how that’s possible – the Whole Grain Stamp is on so many prepared products that working with the actual grain ingredients ourselves might get lost, pushed to the back of the shelf in our minds.  Basically, the types of questions we’re asked all boil down to “What are these things?” and “What am I supposed to do with them?”  Truth be told, I myself have asked my fair share of questions just like those, so if I can answer mine through kitchen experiments, maybe I can answer yours just by sharing.

Q:  Are you going to do this every Wednesday?
A:  Probably not, but I hope to get one or two posts in every month.  They may be tied to our various Grain of the Month celebrations, they may not, but they’ll always appear on Wednesdays and I promise they’ll always be fun!

Q:  Sound good!  So… what are you eating?
A:  Can you guess by looking at the photo here?

No?  Nothing?  Well tune in next Wednesday (May 5) and I’ll let you know!  (Kara)