Discovering Oat Milk

Ever since I was a child I have loved everything 'oats' porridge is a firm favourite of mine, as is flapjack, but now I have discovered oat milk!

My first discovery during lockdown was that we now have a milkman back in our area. This is a great service not just delivering milk, but juice, croissants, cereal, yoghurt and even vegetables. Personally, apart from the obvious of reusing the glass bottles which is better for the environment, I think the milk tastes better. So I promptly placed my order for a couple of bottles of full milk with the new milkman (it has to be full and my excuse is I don't drink a lot of it, prefering black tea and coffee) and decided to try oat milk.

I was expecting this to be quite watery like almond milk, but to my delight, I found it is rich and creamy like full milk but tastes of oats. I am hooked!

So are there any benefits to this substitute milk?

Of course it is vegan and the vegan milk market is growing rapidly. Sixteen million people in the UK choose vegan milk over traditional cows milk. Some medical professionals believe dairy products can increase the risk of some serious diseases like breast cancer. There's also the environment to consider, animal agriculture is responsible for high greenhouse gas emissions for example.

So what is oat milk? Simple to make it is just one part oats with two parts water. Allow the oats to soak up the water then strain. The liquid left is the oat milk, it's that simple.

Oats are a great source of fibre. When they are processed into milk they can lose some of the nutrients but retain some calcium and iron. Some bought varieties are fortified with vitamin D and A.

This is going to be a great addition to my morning porridge or overnight oats and much healthier than dairy milk too!