Back-to-School (Make-Ahead) Breakfast: Baked Oatmeal

I have to be perfectly honest: I had every intention of coming back from our trip ready to hit the ground. I thought I would have mapped out the perfect back-to-school meals, snacks and lunchbox ideas...carefully planned out how I was going to get that elusive "me" time while the kids were at school...organized all of the articles I've been tearing out and piling up all summer into a tidy binder so I could quickly and easily share new ideas with you all. And the truth is, I spent most of August just enjoying the summer with my kids. Now I'm back, but definitely not focused yet. I can't tell if my head's spinning upon re-entry or if it's just still in (blissful) vacation mode? By the end of the week, both kids will be back in school and I'll probably feel a little bit more organized. But for now, I'm just restocking the fridge/freezer after the week long Hurricane Irene power outage, and focusing on kicking off the new school year on a high note. In that spirit, I wanted to share a new make-ahead breakfast recipe with you all! We gave it a whirl yesterday and it was a hit.

Baked Oatmeal (with Bananas & Almonds)

based upon Heidi Swanson's Super Natural Every Day's Baked Oatmeal

(makes 8 servings)

butter, to grease the baking dish

2 cups rolled oats

1/2 cup slivered almonds

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 teaspoons cinnamon

dash of salt

2 cups milk

1 egg

1/4 cup agave (optional)

3 Tablespoons butter, melted

2 teaspoons vanilla

3 ripe bananas, cut into 1/2" pieces

Preheat oven to 375. Butter an 8" round or square baking dish. In one bowl, combine dry ingredients: oats, almonds, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. In a second bowl, combine the wet ingredients: milk, egg, agave (if using), melted butter and vanilla. Place a single layer of sliced bananas in the bottom of the baking dish. (Pictured above; I used two of the bananas here and the third banana as the topping.) Cover the bananas with the oat mixture. Drizzle the milk mixture over the oats. You may want to gently tap the baking dish on your counter top, just to make sure the milk mixture moves through the oats. Arrange remaining banana on top. Bake for approximately 40 minutes, or until top is golden and the baked oatmeal has set. Let cool for a few minutes before slicing and serving.

Can be made ahead and slices may be reheated in the oven or microwave, until warmed through.

Here is the recipe in photos with a few of my additional notes:

I made this recipe with what we had on hand: bananas and slivered almonds. As such, it came out smelling and tasting like breakfast-worthy banana bread. The original recipe from Super Natural Every Day's cookbook calls for walnuts, bananas and your choice of fresh berries. If you'd like to follow the orig recipe, the steps would stay the same but your measurements would be: 2 bananas on the bottom of the pan + walnuts instead of slivered almonds in the oat mixture + 1 1/2 cups of fresh berries scattered over the top before baking, instead of that last banana. Really, you can use any type of nut you like, and any type of fruit to top it. But the way we made it was really good, so I'd probably just stick with my almond-banana version. Anyway, in the photo above, the bananas have been covered with the oat mixture, and then I am going to drizzle the milk mixture over the oats.
I did gently tap the baking dish on my counter top, just to make sure the milk mixture moved through the oats. Then I arranged slices of the third banana on top.

The baking time should be between 35-45 minutes. It took 41 minutes for the top of my dish to be golden brown and the baked oatmeal to set. It's goopey if you serve it right away. Best to let it cool for a few minutes before slicing and serving.

This is a perfect breakfast to make ahead, and simply reheat slices in the oven or microwave on a school morning. Or, if your new school year resolution is to workout before the kids get up, you could always do the quick assembly, pop it into the oven and let it bake while you workout. The amazing smell wafting from your kitchen as it bakes should get the kids out of bed in time to make the school bus.

Cooking with Little Ones: Homemade Granola

I blew into town last night, just before the heavy snow. In case you hadn’t noticed, it was very quiet over here the past week, as I was enjoying a decadent week away with my mom where the only thing we had to worry about was which yoga class to take, whether to hike or take a breathing workshop, and whether to have dinner at 6:30, 7:30 or 8:00. Bliss I tell you.

Anyhow, local schools were cancelled today, which was nice because I hadn’t spent quality time with my children in a week. On my flights home, I had earmarked all sorts of recipes from Mark Bittman’s book, Food Matters, and jotted down this elaborate shopping list, excited to launch back into cooking after being cooked for for the past fifteen meals.

After the novelty of making Valentines wore off, my littlest one wanted to cook together. Truth be told, he wanted cookies, and I think he figured asking to cook together just might make a couple dozen appear. No such luck on Day 1 back from the spa. But close, since oats/butter/sugar/flour were some of the only things on hand. I’d left the home stocked with plentiful frozen meals and enough fruits and veggies to last the week, intending to do a major marketing run upon my return. But the snow was keeping us in, so I honed in on a recipe that we could whip up together with what we did have on hand…and this recipe happens to also be perfect for little hands because it involves dumping and stirring, that’s it. Today I tried Mark Bittman’s granola recipe, which is very similar to the one I posted a couple of months back, minus the olive oil and his has a higher proportion of oats to nuts/coconut.

Anything Goes Granola from Food Matters by Mark Bittman
Makes a lot of granola!

5 cups of rolled oats
3 cups of mixed nuts (we used walnuts, pecans, and slivered almonds)
1 cup of shredded, unsweetened coconut
Cinnamon, to taste
½ - 1 cup of agave or honey (we used half of each and probably put ¾ cup in)
Sea salt, dash of
Vanilla (but we didn’t have any on hand)
1 cup of raisins (which we also didn’t have, so we used cranberries)

Preheat oven to 350. Mix rolled oats, nuts, coconut, cinnamon, honey, sea salt in a big bowl. Spread the mixture on a rimmed cookie sheet and bake for 30 minutes, stirring once or twice during the cook time. Once it comes out of the oven, stir in the raisins (or cranberries). Cool and then store in an airtight container.

Mark says that it will “keep indefinitely in the fridge” but I think we’ll blow through this batch in the next few days. Excellent eaten plain for a snack (if you have a vacuum nearby), eaten like cereal, or made into yogurt parfaits.

Easy Kid-Pleasing Granola

In the October 2009 issue of Health magazine’s Best in Food section, there’s a blurb saying you can “Steal This Dish” and it gives Jamie Oliver’s recipe for Easy Granola. I’d torn it out and filed it into my recipe binders thinking I’d give it a whirl one day. I’m a pretty horrible baker, since I prefer to slice, toss in and stir what I have on hand or what looks good at the market that day, instead of follow instructions. But this one had promise. Well, at least I hoped it was more flexible because I decided to tackle it this afternoon with what I had on hand. It turned out beautifully, and both kids approved. So, now I pass it along to you.

My Easy Granola (That’s a Combination of Jamie Oliver’s and Cooking Light’s and What I Had On Hand)

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.

On a rimmed baking sheet, I combined:
2 cups of old-fashioned oats
1 cup of nuts (I used raw slivered almonds from Trader Joe’s)
½ cup of unsweetened coconut (which I’d gotten in a tub in the produce section of Walter Stewart’s)
About 5 tablespoons of maple syrup
3 Tablespoons of olive oil (yes, olive oil-- it works!)
About 2 teaspoons of cinnamon (because we really like cinnamon, but use less if you want)
About 2 teaspoons of vanilla (which we also really like around here)
½ teaspoon of kosher salt

I gave everything a little toss on the sheet with my spatula and then baked it for 20 minutes, taking it out and stirring it every 5 minutes (so stirring 4 times total). Then when it was golden brown, I took it out, and put it into a mixing bowl with ½ a bag of dried cranberries (so probably about ¾ cup). The berries plumped up in the heat. I tasted it, and it was good, but could use just a little more sweetness so I then put a hearty squeeze of honey on it, gave it one more stir. Served it to my boys for lunch with whole milk and they ate it right up. Love that. This one’s a keeper.