My Dad’s Oatmeal: “You could hang paper with that stuff.”

On the first morning of college, I headed for the McComb’s center for breakfast with my FYS. Breakfast is buffet style so we grabbed plates and got in line. After filling my plate with bacon, scrambled eggs, and hash browns, I just happened to look down and see that oatmeal was also an option for breakfast. I walked away, remembering that I am not very fond of oatmeal. For me, oatmeal always brings up bittersweet memories of my high school soccer days at Sandia High School.

When I was a freshman in high school, I badly wanted to make the c-team. In order to ensure that the coaches knew your name and that you were in shape for tryouts, attending the conditioning was a must. These practices were intense and often times girls would vomit because they ate too heavy of a breakfast or they got very light-headed because they did not eat breakfast at all.

To avoid having this problem my dad suggested that I eat oatmeal every morning before practice. He further suggested his special recipe for “700 year-old oatmeal.” He claimed his recipe was handed down through generations of Scots on his mother’s side. (Yes, the Kincaid’s have their own tartan). The recipe was simple: half and half, water, and steel cut oats cooked in a crock-pot for 3 hours. At the end of the cooking time, my father would stir the oatmeal with his spurtle and gleefully announce, “You could hang paper with that stuff.” I ate a bowl each morning, Monday through Friday, for 5 weeks of preseason soccer, every August, every summer for 4 years. I never liked my dad’s oatmeal, but I never got sick or lightheaded during practice. I have asked my grandmother and she says she knows nothing about a “Kincaid family oatmeal recipe.”