We’ve been eating oatmeal for breakfast for over a decade, and we’re not bored yet!
Not only are there a bunch of options to choose from for the grain itself (quick oats, rolled oats, thick rolled oats, steel cut, oat bran), but it can also be prepared 1,000 ways. You don’t even have to cook it – it can be soaked in juice, plant milk, plant yogurt, or hot water.
Here are two ways we grab oatmeal on the go for an easy, cheap plant-based breakfast during the week:
The Soak in a Tupperware Method
Every morning when Derek gets up to go to our personal training studio at 4 or 5 am to train clients, he’s usually far too confused and sleepy to prepare anything complicated for breakfast. Also, both of us prefer to delay eating until later, preferably after a workout. So how do we delay breakfast until after we’ve left the house without buying food?
The magic of dry oats, hot water, and a glass tupperware! We put all the oatmeal components (and toppings like chopped apple or dates and walnuts) into a container, and let it soak up the liquid as we go about our business, until it’s ready to eat at a more reasonable hour like 9 am.
Super easy!
The Cookie Method
This tip is thanks to Minimalist Baker! These oatmeal cookies can be prepared over the weekend and will last a couple of days into the week.
If you pulse oats a bit in a food processor, then mix with mashed banana, you can make cookies by scooping them with an ice cream scoop onto a pan and baking them in the oven at 350 for around 10 minutes.
Add cinnamon, flax seeds or meal, nut or seed butter, chocolate chips, nuts – or even make jam thumbprint cookies:
These are highly portable in a container and also make great kid snacks.
No need to eat processed bars or cereals when a whole foods plant-based breakfast is so simple (and so much cheaper too)!
