She Cooks! Overnight Oats 2 Ways
I love oatmeal. No matter what low-carb, paleo, fad diet of the week comes up, oatmeal will always be part of my routine. It's healthy, it lowers cholesterol and it gives you tons of energy.
Overnight Oats have been gaining in popularity, I have seen tons of blog posts about them, articles, recipes, etc. So chances are, even if you haven't tried them yet, you've heard of them. And if you haven't ever heard of them, crawl out from under your rock and get excited-because they are tasty.
Basically you take oats, you soak them overnight in some type of milk and mix-ins and in the morning they are 'cooked' and you eat them. Hearty enough for a cold weather breakfast, but because they are served cold, they are refreshing enough for summer.
Now, if you're anything like Terrence and me, you get burned out eating the same things all the time. We rotate oats with eggs, plant based chocolate-coconut protein shakes, and juicing. As in all things we strive to keep things healthy, nutrition centered and vegetarian. Here are two of our favorite recipes for Overnight Oats almost worth getting out of bed for.
Chocolate-Peanut Butter-Coconut Oats -Cocoa powder, PB2, Coconut Almond Milk Yogurt
&
Cinnamon-Honey-Cherry Oats -Cinnamon, Honey, Dried Cherries, Plain Almond Milk Yogurt
The Ingredients:
By and large the ingredients are similar. We use coconut milk as the base and some type of almond milk yogurt. For the Honey-Cherry I use plain, and for the Chocolate-PB2 I use coconut flavored.
The basics:
Chia Seeds
Oats (DUH) Steel Cut-NOT instant
Coconut Milk (or almond)
Almond Milk yogurt (only because we don't really use any cow milk in our house when we can help it)
Stevia
The ingredients that differ between the two are listed above.
The Method
For both types, you make them the same way. You just add the differing ingredients and stir.
1. Pour about a half cup of oats into a small mason jar. I got my jars at target and I use them all the time. I put a little more oats into Terrence's jar because he is a growing boy.
2. Split a tablespoon of chia seeds between the two jars.
3. Add in the different ingredients. There is no particular order-but I always do milk last.
For the Cinnamon-Cherry-Honey Oats:
-1/2 tablespoon of cinnamon
-5-6 drops of stevia
-1-2 tablespoons of honey depending on how sweet your tooth is
-handful of dried cherries
-2 tablespoons of yogurt
-just over half cup of coconut milk and stir well.
Screw top on and store in fridge
For the Chocolate-PB2-Coconut Oats
-1 heaping tbsp cocoa powder
-1 heaping tbsp PB2 (if you aren't familiar with PB2, it's a defatted peanut butter powder, you just add water or milk or whatever and you reconstitute into a spreadable, edible substance. Check out netrition.com)
-5-6 drops of stevia
-2 tbsp coconut flavored almond yogurt
-just over a half cup of coconut milk and stir well.
Screw on top tight and store in fridge overnight.
They should look like this when you put them in the fridge:
Voila! Make ahead, yummy, refreshing, healthy, hearty breakfast is waiting for you. When opening them up in the morning, stir them up really well, and then top with fresh fruit or sliced almonds...or leave as is! Feel free to add more coconut milk if it comes out too thick.
Please share any of your own favorite toppings/overnight oat ingredients! Always on the lookout for new ideas!
