Strawberry Almond Baked Oatmeal {A Soaked Oat Recipe}

Oatmeal Gets A Makeover

 

I can just see it now, spread across the tabloids of Real-Food-Topia, “Plain Jane Baked Oatmeal gets a glamorous new makeover!”

“Was plastic surgery involved?”

Baked Oatmeal’s fans are tweeting like crazy with phrases like “too good to be true,” and “party in my mouth” being thrown around. This makeover won’t soon be forgotten. Humble baked oatmeal is barely recognizable with the addition of delicate almonds and fresh strawberry puree. Splash on some heavy cream and the usual weekday breakfast fodder is now dressed up for a decadent weekend brunch.

Allow Me To Introduce Myself

 

Hi I’m Melodie: traditional foods nerd, nutrition enthusiast, and recipe developer, to name a few of my food-related rolls.

I grew up in West Africa as the child of missionaries (a wonderful experience!) and from an early age enjoyed cooking and baking. Only in Africa, grocery shopping looks a lot different than it does here.

Locally grown food is sold in open-air markets, and imported goods like butter and cheese are only found in the big cities at expensive supermarkets.

So I learned to work with local ingredients and the rare imported food item purchased on special trips to the big city. (One village we lived in was 8 hours away from the closest supermarket!).

Thus I became adept at recipe makeovers. Which is why when the first strawberries of this season started to appear in the grocery store I knew I wanted to dress up baked oatmeal with this beautiful fruit.

 

 

You see, I’m crazy about baked oatmeal. I’ve determined it’s the healthy, frugal eater’s breakfast of choice.

“What’s wrong with whole-grain breakfast cereal?” you ask.  “The healthy stuff; you know, not the sugary, colored stuff?”

Ah…you must be new to the traditional foods scene.

 

The Truth About Boxed Breakfast Cereal

 

Boxed breakfast cereal is a modern food. Traditionally eggs, bacon, soaked porridge, fruit, cultured dairy, and sourdough bread were regular breakfast fare. Breakfasts were not so carb focused and more nutrient dense.

It really is ironic how popular breakfast cereal is, as just about every kind on the market is loaded with sugar and made of highly processed grains. Most are the equivalent of eating a couple of cookies, yet young and old alike regularly choose this food for breakfast.

The grains, even those labeled as “whole grains” are processed at very high heat and most undergo a process called extrusion which renders the proteins toxic, according to some studies. Even granolas contain tons of sugar and are baked at very high heat.

How sad that boxed breakfast cereal is now the cultural breakfast of choice, especially for little children who need to make the most of every calorie consumed. But if you’re going to replace easy and tasty cereal with something healthy, it has to taste good. Especially when children are involved.

 

Baked Oatmeal; The Healthy, Economical Breakfast Choice

 

Enter baked oatmeal. It’s cheap, tasty, can be served with milk and dried fruit like regular breakfast cereal, there are many flavor variations, it can be made in advance to be eaten the following morning, and it appeals to both children and adults. Plus, by soaking the oats through the night the traditional method of porridge preparation is mimicked and the oats are made more digestible and nutritious.

If you’ve been to my blog you know that baked oatmeal is one of my favorite healthy breakfast foods.  I’ve got several baked oatmeal recipes on my blog that have been very popular!

• Basic Baked Oatmeal
• Blueberry Banana Baked Oatmeal
• Cocoa Beach Baked Oatmeal

I even started a baked oatmeal blog just for this one breakfast food!  Despite the many recipes I already have, I just can’t resist experimenting with new flavors!

Last summer I was all about the blueberries and bananas. In the fall I perfected a Cranberry Orange recipe. This spring, it’s all about the strawberries! Who knows what this summer will bring :-)?

 

A Few Notes About Soaking Grains

 

For those who aren’t familiar with the concept, soaking grains in an acidic medium for 12-24 hours helps predigest the grain and break down nutrient blockers making the nutrients far more digestible by the human body.

Grains (which are seeds) contain phytates (nutrient blockers) and other substances designed to keep the grain from deteriorating until the optimum conditions are obtained for germination. This is a good thing for the seed, but a bad thing for the human digestive tract.

Unless a grain is properly prepared it cannot be digested well. Soaking dissolves the phytates and makes the vitamins and minerals found in the grain (those being protected so fiercely for germination) bioavailable to our bodies.

I recently learned from this informative post that oats do not contain a lot of phytase (used to help break down phytate). So with this baked oatmeal recipe, I’ve added a small amount of whole wheat flour, or buckwheat flour for a gluten-free option, to increase the phytase.

 

A Few Tips For This Recipe

 

Plain Greek yogurt can be used in place of the regular yogurt, just decrease the yogurt to 1/4 cup and increase the water to 1/2 cup.

For a gluten-free recipe, use gluten-free oats and buckwheat flour. You could also try omitting the whole wheat flour.  The recipe should still turn out great, though the phytate won’t break down as much.

The strawberry sauce can be made in advance to save time before you make the recipe.

Due to the extra moisture from the strawberry sauce, I don’t recommend trying to substitute a liquid sweetener for the granulated options I’ve listed below.

 

 

Print

 

What’s your favorite way to prepare oatmeal for breakfast?