Oat Cakes of the Week & Work-in-progress Topping

With the semester in full swing, I haven't had as much time to play around with oat cakes but they are still part of my all-important elevenses (!) with a cup of tea. I prep 6 of them at once on Sunday, and sometimes a seventh experimental version. A Reddit user told me they microwaved decently so I have been trying that out. Can you guess which one was my first attempt?

Each of these is one "serving:

6 muffin cups

1 thin loaf

1/2 round flat loaf

If you're willing to tolerate some textural variation, they all cook in 35 minutes at 375 convection.

Yep, that fat Quasimodo was cooked in the same tin as the regular thin loaf I am holding. (Jen cooks two servings in the same loaf pan, for 35 minutes.) Nuking it 5 minutes on high was much too long -- it was quite dry.

If you care, how to spruce these up:

The round is made with a less favored brand of oat fiber I am trying to use up -- it doesn't fluff up as much (and weighs about 60g for 1/2 c to the usual 40-45g), but the stronger taste works well with a spice blend and pancake syrup. The muffin versions typically get 2 T of powdered PB or coconut flour (add a touch more liquid for the latter) or up to 3T cocoa powder for 12. I recently got fancy and added about 15g rice flour and 1 t matcha powder -- not bad. No pictures, sorry. The small rectangular loaves get 15g whey protein powder, flavored or not - for 2 loaves. I improvise a spread with 2 T cashew milk, 1 T nut flour (peanut, almond, sesame) and a pinch of xanthan gum and sweetener to taste. The loaves typically get 15g whey protein isolate (flavored or not) for both, which is by far the best texture. Look at that crumb!

I recently improvised a topping that turned out like a cross between pudding and frosting, which I have been trying to recreate ever since. The version shown here is 2 oz each cashew milk and cottage cheese, blended with 5 g (1T) whey protein, a pinch of xanthan gum and some added sweetener. It was far too soft. (Yes, I made this particular oat cake pink. Cake batter protein powder with raspberry and vanilla extracts, if you care. And sugar free raspberry jam on the side.)

Even with a soft, custardy topping, this was delicious. I'll be fiddling with the cottage cheese to milk ratio and other textural add-ons. Today was 4 oz cottage cheese, 3 oz cashew milk, 1 T each protein powder and sugar free pudding mix with 1/4 t xantham whipped up super thick. No picture, but really tasty -- the pudding really stiffens up the whole thing.

#sweet #alternativefoods #recipetesting