Ruby on Rails

Okay, so my issue here is:

If the cache key is just based on the Posts, then the controller code will pull the Authors association for no reason (we don't actually need it, because the author names are cached until the Post models are touched). This makes me think I should remove the .includes() call from my controller, since it will cause an unnecessary db query 99% of the time.

On the other hand, if I remove the .includes() call from my controller, then whenever the cache does expire, I have an n-queries situation, which also seems bad.

Is there any way to have the best of both worlds here?

A related question:

I've also found it helpful to use lower-level caching in my Post model to cache the "recent" query like so:

post.rb

self.recent do
  Rails.cache.fetch('recent_posts', expires_in: 1.day) do
    self.order(created_at: :desc).to_a
  end
end

Here I have a similar problem. If I don't include the `.to_a` at the end, then I'm only caching the scope, which will still evaluate and seemingly (at least in development) trigger a db query on every pageview. If I do include the `.to_a` then I forfeit the ability to use `.includes()` in my individual controller actions or views.

Again, is there a way to have the best of both worlds here?