I realized it’s been a while since I’ve shared any of my recipe experimentations with you guys, so I have a great one for today! I’ve been wanting to come up with some fresh breakfast ideas to break up the neverending yogurt/egg sandwich/yogurt/egg sandwich cycle that I’ve been rolling with lately. This one was Pinterest-inspired and ended up being a super success! Sorry in advance for the not-so-lovely photos. I can’t find my camera anywhere this week, so they’re all phone snaps.
I came across this recipe from Inspired Taste on Pinterest and it met my two main criteria for a recipe: it looked yummy and I already had all the ingredients. Done!
I stuck to the basics, but made a handful of changes and substitutions, most notably omitting all the sugar. It would probably be a little more dessert-y with the brown sugar included, but I wanted to make it a little healthier and I figured it would be plenty sweet enough with the fruit and chocolate (it was!).
Strawberry Banana Chocolate Chip Baked Oatmeal
(adapted from Inspired Taste)
Ingredients:
- 2 cups old fashioned oats
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 cup sliced strawberries
- 1/2 cup mini chocolate chips
- 2 cups milk (any kind; I used skim)
- 1 egg, beaten
- 3 tbsp butter, melted
- 2 tsp vanilla
- 1 ripe banana, sliced
Directions:
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Spray an 8” x 8” baking dish with cooking spray (you can also use a larger pan, but this smaller size makes your baked oatmeal thicker and chewier, which is a plus in my opinion).
- In a large bowl, gently mix together the oats, baking powder, pumpkin pie spice, cinnamon, salt, half the strawberries, and half the mini chocolate chips. Spread this dry mixture evenly in your baking dish.
- Scatter the remaining strawberries and mini chocolate chips, as well as the sliced banana, over the top of the oat mixture.
- In the same bowl you just used (yay for fewer dirty dishes!), whisk together the milk, egg, melted butter, and vanilla. Pour this mixture slowly and evenly over the oats. Tip the baking dish back and forth slightly to evenly distribute the liquid.
- Bake oatmeal for 35 minutes, or until the mixture is set and the dish is lightly browned on top.
This baked oatmeal turned out pretty perfectly! I had a big square when it was hot out of the oven and the chocolate was all melty and gooey – yum. This morning, I had a slice cold for breakfast with a big dollop of Greek yogurt on top and it was excellent like that, too! This will definitely be a new breakfast staple – it was so easy to make and is naturally customizable if you use different fruit, no chocolate, keep the brown sugar topping, add peanut butter (peanut butter baked oatmeal… brain wave!!), etc…
One quick note: this would be a great meal to make for a big breakfast gathering where it would be gone in one sitting. If you’re not going to get through it all at once, store it covered and refrigerated or you will be sad. I made some beautiful blueberry lemon coffee cake a couple of weeks ago and had only one slice, because I didn’t think to refrigerate it (duh) and the milk in it turned. Blech. The bananas on top will brown after being in the fridge, but it tastes the same. Maybe a squeeze of lemon juice would help that? Or you could not use bananas.
This batch is already almost half-gone, but I might experiment with doubling the recipe and baking it in a 13” x 9” dish to make it go farther. Or you could make it in muffin tins to create individual servings – even easier for grab-and-go breakfast and snacks!
I’ve been even busier than usual lately (the countdown is on: less than two months left on the Outer Banks! happysad) so this is the first time I’ve baked something in a while, but now I’m craving it again! I have a few overripe bananas staring at me from the fruit bowl that have some serious bread potential… mmm.
Any great new recipes out there?
