Gluten-Free Dairy-Free Oatmeal Raisin Breakfast Cookies

When I was in fourth grade George Michael was everything. And I mean everythang…

It was the year that his epic album “Faith” came out in cassette form (look them up, kiddos, they were a thing). To a fourth grade girl, with budding curiosity about boys, this walking specimen of maleness was very, very, intriguing. Those jeans. That leather jacket. The stubble. The swagger. Those daring lyrics.

I recognize that in our current culture, that’s basic choir music. But I was eight and this was the relatively chaste 1980s, so someone singing “I Want Your Sex” was kind of a shocker. But also, super, super cool.

At the time it seemed to my little girl self that owning this cassette tape, complete with the full fold-out lyric sheet (so I never missed a word), was a NEED. An actual need. It was so desperate I actually felt it in my bones. Not yet burdened down by the consequences of ownership and complicated adult matters like finances, health, and whether or not it’s morally appropriate to sing ‘I Want Your Sex” when you are not yet, in fact, capable of understanding exactly what sex is, kids can feel need differently, almost with reckless abandon. And I wanted this cassette with this type of child-like abandon. It actually hurt.

I burned for this cassette tape. I needed it.

But my parents, being on the stricter side, said NO. Hard No. Full Stop. 

If I remember it correctly, in an effort to appear open-minded they did me a solid and let me borrow the cassette for ONE night from a friend so they could review it and make a final determination. Given the graphic nature of the lyrics, though, it didn’t take long for them to drop the hammer. That cassette was making it into my hands over their dead bodies. That was clear.

*It’s important to add that my parents are, in fact, still living. So I still don’t own the cassette.*

Knowing what I know about my parents, I knew this was an immovable decree. It was not changing. Also knowing, as an eight-year-old in1980s rural Maryland, that I had no way of getting this cassette on the down-low (because it was the 80’s which meant to listen to music you needed a ride to the record store, money to purchase a cassette, and a cassette player to listen on–none of which I had).  So I was distraught. Destroyed. Alone.

Because everyone else had it. Like, the whole world. I’m serious. To my eight-year-old self, I was the only child on the face of this huge planet without access to George Micahel’s magic music 24-7. I felt totally and utterly left out.

And I was bereft.

Now, in retrospect, I see the flaws in my thinking. First of all, we now know that George Michael was not, in fact, an attainable target for me. Not because I was eight. But because I was of the wrong sex. We did not know this then. Second of all, clearly there were other children without the cassette. My parents were surely not the only ones to shudder at the sound of their child singing “Baby, I want to touch your body.” As a parent now, I realize that there were probably more kids around me without the cassette than with, but the ones in my direct line of vision were the only ones that mattered.

They had George. I didn’t. And that’s all I could see.

I felt left out. And it killed me.

Fast forward 33 years. I’m a parent now. I’ve got three kids of my own. And at this moment, one of them hates me because of my own HARD NO on something that is making her feel left out and alone. And it’s making me want to call my mom and beg for forgiveness. For real.

My daughter, at just nine-yers-old, really really wants TikTok. Don’t know it? It’s a fun little social media app that most children have. It’s a lip-syncing thing and is, for all intents and purposes, mild and safe. But I don’t feel right about it. I have zero desire for my NINE-YEAR-OLD to have social media of any kind, no matter how benign it is. It’s a can of worms I’m not interested in opening. I have no desire for her to have access to overly sexualized dances, which she will no doubt try to re-create (flashback to eight-year-old Meaghan singing raunchy George Micahel lyrics in 3,2,1…). Even if there is only a .001% chance of a video of her dancing along to some Taylor Swift song landing in the hands of a 27-year-old man who lives with his mother and has a penchant for little girls, yeah, I’m not gonna take it. And there is no guarantee that this wouldn’t happen. 

All of the controls on earth can’t account for the depravity of a dirty mind intent on harm. And these controls, they’ve proven themselves faulty before and they will again.

It’s a chance I’m not willing to take. And I’m paying for it. 

We have had tears. Tantrums. Screaming. Pleading. Begging. Bargaining. Supreme Court Level Debating. We’ve had it all. Because she feels left out.

And the human side of me, the one who was once a little girl herself, feels her pain. I know how hard it feels to be the only one without. I know what it feels like to be the only one on the outside, seemingly stranded on an island, missing out on inside jokes, inside dances, and all the things. I can feel it in my stomach. My heart aches for her.

But the parent side of me, she’s all “OH NO YOU DIDN’T….”

During the course of this on-going discussion, I have said “I don’t care what your friends have” more times than I can even count. I have opened my mouth and heard my mother come tumbling out so many times I am beginning to forget where I end and she begins. I am saying the same things about a different object that were said to me 33 years ago. And I give exactly ZERO cares how left out she feels. Because this mom isn’t budging.

Listen, I’m not saying TikTok is evil and only bad parents let their kids have it. Chalk this up to my lazy self not having the energy to monitor this to the extent I would feel comfortable with her having it. Consider it my faulty logic to not want to expose her to something I don’t quite understand the implications of.  This does not mean I think it’s bad. It means it’s not for her. Not right now.

But man, parenting…why is it so butt kicking all of the dang time?

My heart breaks for her as she cries. I don’t want to negate these feelings. It hurts me that she hurts. But that doesn’t change how we feel about this rule. It’s a hard stop. She doesn’t get to have it AND she doesn’t get to participate in her friend’s videos because I have zero control over who has access to them (this is a source of much contention, believe me). And there is no wiggle room. No negotiating. Nothing.

Enforcing it might take a few years off of my life. I might cringe every time she comes home from school with a defeated look on her face, feeling left out and alone on the playground while all of her friends practice the TikTok dances she doesn’t know. It makes me sad when she says she doesn’t have any friends at school, that she feels more at home at the gym where everyone has the same rules regardless of age or ability. It hurts my heart.

But I’ve got to stand strong, right? Can’t back down now. My only hope, that when she is my age and dealing with a daughter who feels so left out it physically hurts her heart, she can look back at this experience and laugh. She’ll hopefully understand then that parenting sometimes means saying no and breaking hearts to keep your children safe. Maybe then she’ll see that it means loving your child enough to let them hate you right now so they can thank you later. And maybe, most of all, she’ll see how very much it hurts to watch your child hurt, no matter the reason.

This is love at its finest, right there.  

And I’m also crossing my fingers that I, too, will have my moment of retrospective vindication. The universe handed my parents the perfect “I told you so” with George Michael. I can only hope that it will do the same for me.

Take heart, parents, this journey is hard. But we’re in it together. 

Gluten-Free Dairy-Free Oatmeal Raisin Breakfast Cookies

Ok, so the funny part about this recipe is that I had a completely different one locked and loaded for today. I made this incredible completely vegan Lemon Orzo Soup that I can’t wait to share with you. But then, this morning at 7:00 AM I got a wild hair and decided to play around with my very popular Gluten-Free Dairy-Free Peanut Butter Oatmeal Breakfast Cookie. I didn’t intend on posting it, mostly because it’s crazy talk to create a recipe, bake it, photograph it and then post it all in the span of a few hours.

Most of the time it takes me weeks to create something. Just so you know.

But I guess because I laid the groundwork this one was easier to get right on the first try. And I did. the soup’s coming next week, but this one needed to go out today (because I wanted it to).

It’s a toss-up on which version I like better. These cookies, with their delicate spices and chewy raisins, seem like they were meant for this vehicle. I mean, it’s not a far stretch from a traditional oatmeal cookie so it makes sense. The texture we love in the first cookie is the same, the flavors are just different.

Which leads me to think: what combo can you come up with? Send me your favorites. I want to see them! 

Peace love and George Michael,

Meg

Gluten-Free Dairy-Free Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

January 24, 2020

Prep: 5 min

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By: Meaghan Dawson

Ingredients

• 3 large ripe bananas, mashed
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 2 tablespoons maple syrup
• 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
• 2 cups gluten-free quick oats
• pinch of salt
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoons nutmeg
• 1/2 (or more) raisins

Directions

• Step 1 Preheat oven to 350 and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
• Step 2 In a large bowl, combine bananas, applesauce, maple syrup and vanilla. Stir.
• Step 3 Add in dry ingredients (oats, spices, salt, and raisins). Stir to combine.
• Step 4 Using your hands or an ice cream scoop if you don’t like to get messy, scoop out a few tablespoons of batter and form into a ball.
• Step 5 Place on baking sheet and flatten into a cookie shape.
• Step 6 Repeat.
• Step 7 Bake for 13-15 minutes or until golden brown on edges.
• Step 8 Cool on a wire rack and store any leftovers in the fridge for 3-5 days.

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