Last week’s Cooking with Robyn video talked a bit about smoothies, as one breakfast go-to that is great for quickly adding lots of nutrition into your morning. This week, we wanted to expand on other ideas for quick breakfasts for people who don’t necessarily have time to cook in the morning. Today I’m going to highlight a blog called the Minimalist Baker by Dana Shultz – and she also has this cookbook “Minimalist Baker’s Everyday Cooking”, but the recipes I’ll talk about are right from the blog. Once you know the basic ratios, these recipes can be adjusted however you like. You can find her cookbook at the library by clicking here.
One breakfast that tons of people swear by is oatmeal. For those of you that don’t have time to cook oatmeal before work, one great option is ‘overnight oats’. The basic premise is that if you let oats sit in liquid overnight, they reach a consistency that is ready to eat the next morning.
The basic ratio that the Minimalist Baker uses is
½ cup milk (whatever type you like)
¾ tbsp chia seeds
½ cup rolled oats
Mix it in a jar or bowl overnight (I prefer jar because then it’s easy to grab and take to work if need be).
From there, this recipe is highly adaptable. One example of this is the Minimalist Baker’s recipe for peanut butter overnight oats: within that particular blog post, she lists lots of other possibilities for tasty overnight oats recipes. Her peanut butter oats recipe just calls for the oats, chia seeds, milk, along with 2 tbsp natural peanut butter or almond butter, and 1 tbsp of maple syrup. Make sure all the ingredients (particularly the oats) are immersed in milk and leave overnight and it’ll be ready to enjoy the next day. (https://minimalistbaker.com/peanut-butter-overnight-oats/)
If you are not a huge fan of oats, there are a few great alternatives. One ingredient to experiment with (if you have time in the morning) is quinoa-based ‘oatmeal’. Use apple juice or water to boil the quinoa, and add dried, frozen, or fresh fruit and lots of cinnamon – similar to how you would prepare morning oatmeal. If you’re short on time in the mornings, one great alternative to make is overnight chia seed pudding.
In this week’s episode of Cooking with Robyn, we’ll make chocolate chia seed pudding from the Minimalist Baker blog (https://minimalistbaker.com/overnight-chocolate-chia-seed-pudding/).
First, you mix:
¼ cup of cocoa powder
3-5 tbsp maple syrup
½ tsp cinnamon
1 pinch sea salt
½ tsp vanilla extract together in a small bowl.
Then, slowly add 1 ½ cup of milk, and mix until smooth.
Then, you add ½ cup chia seeds, whisk it again, cover it up, and leave it in the fridge for 3 to 5 hours or else overnight.
When I make this recipe, I like to add frozen blueberries (or fresh if you have them on hand) and frozen ones will thaw overnight so you haven’t heated them but aren’t eating them frozen either.
An alternative to pure chia seeds is the three-seed mixture from bulk barn mentioned in last week’s video. I love this mix because flax seeds, hemp seeds, and chia seeds are all high in nutrients and antioxidants, so mixing them together means getting a variety of nutrition from all three sources. Once I got a handle on the chocolate chia seed pudding recipe listed above, I started experimenting. The milk-to-seed-ratio is the most important thing so that you don’t end up with too liquidy a mixture or, alternatively, chia seeds that are still crunchy because there wasn’t enough liquid. I started making this recipe with my three-seed mix and would leave out the cocoa powder for more of a ‘cinnamon’ flavour, add mashed banana, and a variety of other fruits such as dried berries or frozen fruit. I’ll sometimes mix in chopped or slivered nuts, although that can sometimes be better if it’s stirred in at the last minute so they don’t get soggy. So I loved having these initial recipes to turn to, but have enjoyed trying out different combinations using the basic ingredients.
Also, sometimes I will add this three-seed mixture to a bit of yogurt and fruit and leave it for an hour. The yogurt creates the same ‘consistency’ as when you add the seeds to liquid, so it’s a nice way to make a morning favourite more nutritious and filling.
And while I’m speaking of these great seeds, I also wanted to mention a few egg replacements for baking, if you’re ever in a pinch and are out of eggs but still want to make cookies or muffins.
For one egg, you can use one of the following substitutions:
- ¼ cup apple sauce
- ¼ cup pureed banana
- 1 tbsp ground flaxseed to 2.5 tbsp water (stir and let sit for five minutes before adding to other ingredients)
- 1 tbsp chia seeds to 2.5 tbsp water (stir and let sit for five minutes before adding to other ingredients)
And the last thing I wanted to mention is a few more smoothie tips I thought of since last week. If you aren’t a huge fan of oatmeal but want to enjoy it’s nutritious and filling qualities, there are a ton of recipes out there for smoothies that include oatmeal. One example is the Minimalist Baker’s peach oat smoothie (https://minimalistbaker.com/peach-oat-smoothie/). Also, I’ve learned that if you are running low on milk but still want to make a smoothie, there are a ton of recipes out there that call for coconut water instead of milk. There are also some with orange juice, which perhaps you already knew, but the coconut water was one that I just tried this week for the first time, with delicious results. The recipe I made had 1 cup coconut water, 1 banana, 1 cup blueberries, 1 cup frozen spinach, 1 tbsp almond butter, and 1 tbsp of the 3-seed mix. I highly recommend it, especially as coconut water is high in electrolytes.
And that’s all for today! Check out the video here.
Thanks so much for reading, and have a great rest of your week!