Breakfast on the run

Breakfast can be a stressful time due to may reasons, may be you’re late for work, trying to get the kids ready for school, don’t have much time before or after the gym, whatever the reason, time is of the essence. This is where overnight oats can be an absolute saviour. Really quick, simple and tasty, can be done the night before….yes I know, that’s a little obvious as a clue is in the name!

A few ideas

Once you’ve made this a couple of times, I guarantee you’ll be wanting to experiment and introduce lots of different flavours. That’s the great thing with overnight oats, the options are endless of what to put in it. I’m going to give you a few ideas in this post to start you off, then you’ll be wanting to create your own concoctions immediately.

Ingredients

Depending on your preference you can substitute certain ingredients very easily. When you soak the ingredients overnight, you’ll need to addd some liquid, this can be fresh Fruit juice, Milk, Almond Milk, Rice Milk, Coconut Milk or Coconut Water etc.

Basic Recipe

Here is a basic recipe that you can add pretty much anything to. It is tasty to eat just as it is or top it with other fruits, berries, nuts etc.

serves 1

• 1 cup of Oats
• 1 cup of Natural/Greek Yoghurt
• 1 cup of Fresh Orange Juice or Apple Juice
• 1 dessert spoon of Honey/Agave Syrup (or any other sweetener of your preference)

Method

1. Add all the ingredients together and mix well.
2. Guess what we’re going to do now……..Yes you guessed it, we’re going to leave it overnight!
3. The mixture would have absorbed all the liquid, so add 1 tablespoon of yoghurt just to loosen up the mixture slightly.
4. If you would like to top with berries, grated apple, nuts etc then go ahead or just enjoy immediately.

Matcha, Coconut & Strawberry

Here is a recipe that is a little different. Matcha is not everyones…wait for it…..CUP OF TEA (do you see what I did there). But the health benefits are so extensive that it is worth getting into your diet at whatever chance  you can. Rather than using any sweetener in this recipe, I have topped it with Dates giving it a natural sweetness.

Ingredients

serves 1

• 1 teaspoon Matcha
• 1 cup of Oats
• 1 cup of Coconut Water
• 1 cup of Coconut flavoured Natural Yoghurt
• 4 dates
• handful of Strawberries
• desiccated Coconut

Method

1. Add the Matcha Green Tea, Oats, Coconut Water and Yoghurt together and leave overnight.
2. Mix another tablespoon of yoghurt into the mix to thin a little, chop your dates and strawberries and top. Finally sprinkle with Desiccated Coconut and Enjoy.

Coconut Overnight Oats with Chocolate Chia pudding

This is a great and filling Breakfast or can be done as a super healthy dessert also.

Ingredients

serves 1

Oats Mix

• 1 cup of Oats
• 1/2 cup of desiccated Coconut
• 1 teaspoon of Honey ( or used 3 or 4 chopped dates if you want to use a natural sweetener)
• 1 cup of Coconut and Almond Milk
• 1 cup of Yoghurt

Chocolate Chia seed topping

• 50g Chia seeds
• 250 ml Coconut almond milk
• 3 teaspoons Cacao powder

Method

1. Mix all the Oat ingredients together and place in fridge overnight.
2. For the Chocolate Chia seed topping, again, mix all the ingredients together, place in fridge overnight,
3. In the morning, give the Chia a good mix (you may need to leave it another 15 minutes after mixing in the morning)
4. Layer the Coconut Oats with the Chia Pudding and finally top with fresh berries.

Other ideas

Like I mentioned before, the choices of what you can put into your overnight oats are endless. I have listed below a few more options that you can put into your basic recipe.

• Blueberry Oats (puree up some blueberries, mix through your oat mix and top with some more in the morning)
• Raspberry Oats (As above)
• Mango and Passion fruit (As above)
• Chocolate and Nut (add two teaspoons of Cacao powder into the mix leave overnight, top with some chopped nut in the morning)
• Apple and Cinnamon (make sure you use Apple Juice as the liquid. Grate some apple into your mix and sprinkle a little Cinnamon, leave overnight, then top with a little more apple in the morning.

As you can see, only your imagination is the limit. Let us know here at the Urban Canteen how you got on, if you have any questions then feel free to get in touch. Be sure to check out our Instagram page for more ideas.