I don’t like plain oatmeal. It’s gross.

I’d prefer not to eat it all, but in my lifetime, I’ve read dozens of articles about eating well, and oatmeal always makes the list. Its bountiful benefits include being a good source of energy with protein, helping to regulate cholesterol and blood pressure, being full of fiber, helping to curb your appetite, cancer fighting and is great for your skin. There are a few oatmeal skincare products in my bathroom.

Preparing oatmeal with vanilla almond milk barely improves the taste. I prefer to dress it up by adding any mixture of sliced almonds, ground cinnamon, ground nutmeg, dried cranberries, raisins and honey. I like to eat hot oatmeal the same way I like cold cereal: nice and soupy with lots of milk, not thick and pasty like lumpy mashed potatoes.

The other way I like to consume oatmeal is masked in a smoothie. I try to have a daily  green smoothie with spinach or kale, usually weekday mornings for breakfast before work. Adding oats changes the consistency and taste, but I found that that the two fruits I like it best with are peaches or blueberries. I add a banana to sweeten the taste and Greek yogurt to smoothen out the consistency. If there were a benefit to adding bacon, I’d add that, too.

My favorite, favorite way to eat oatmeal is in cookie form. I know, I know with all the varieties of cookies out there like Milano, fudge, chocolate and sugar cookies, how could I land on oatmeal? I don’t know. It’s similar to when I went through a phase of liking only plain vanilla ice cream. It had to be Breyer’s or Hood. Since then, I’ve at least upgraded to cookies and cream, Good Humor’s Strawberry Shortcake and Klondike bars. Notice there’s still a vanilla base.

I’ve yet to move on to another cookie favorite. I’ll take an oatmeal raisin or oatmeal chocolate chip cookie over any other every time. They’re a smidgen healthier than other cookies, but I’ve got to limit my intake. That’s hard to do when there’s a Potbelly a few blocks from my office.

I tell myself that the oatmeal chocolate chip cookies the size of my palm costing $1.40 ($1.52 with tax) will add up if I buy too many, but once you break a $20 bill the money is as good as gone anyway. I pause for 2.5 seconds about the calories, but in reality, I don’t care. So, I grin and bear the oh-so-good-for-me oatmeal, and less frequently I get do a happy dance in my chair as I enjoy an oatmeal chocolate chip cookie. My grin is ear to ear if the cookie is still warm and soft because it’s fresh from the oven.