Oatmeal was not part of my upbringing. My childhood breakfast in Hungary consisted of hot cocoa with a slice of buttered bread and, when the season permitted, green pepper.

I first encountered oatmeal sometime in the early 1980s after watching Oliver, the 1968 film adaptation of the stage musical based on Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist. What was this “gruel” that Oliver asked for more of, I wondered? When I discovered that it was a version of oatmeal I had to try it. So, I cooked up a batch and liked it, especially when I made it with steel-cut oats, which are simply whole oat grains chopped into two or three small pieces with a steel blade. It made for a hearty dish with a nutty flavour.

The downside was that steel-cut oats require 30 to 40 minutes of cooking with constant stirring. That prompted giving rolled oats a try. These are grains steamed and flattened with large rollers to increase their surface area, enhancing fluid absorption and shortening cooking time. The taste buds weren’t pleased quite as much, but I wasn’t too bothered by this because it turns out that the nutritional profile of oatmeal made from steel-cut or rolled oats is essentially the same.

Now about that nutritional profile. Back then, in those pre-Google 1980s, delving into the science of oats required a trip to the library. As I perused the relevant journals, it became clear that discussions of oats were dominated by their content of beta-glucan, a form of soluble dietary fibre that can help lower cholesterol and keep blood sugar levels stable. By this time, I was already teaching a course on the chemistry of........

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