Kaki!  We’re together on this one: oatmeal for breakfast is where it’s at.  Healthy, tasty, easy AND quick… it’s hard to beat!

My normal oatmeal breakfast is:

• 1/3 cup rolled oats
• 2/3 of a ripe banana, smooshed up (I just, uh, eat the other part)
• 2-3 tablespoons raisins
• pinch salt
• several dashes cinnamon
• hot water from the office coffee machine to cover

Stir vigorously so the banana really melts all up in there.

It’s great… when you have good, ripe bananas.  And it’s good when you have not-quite ripe bananas.  But, for those times when you have multiple bananas that are going just past ripe (all the tiiiime, amirite?)… there’s the glory that is baked oatmeal.

Banana Baked Oatmeal
Adapted from multiple Budget Bytes recipes
Serves 6

Preheat oven to 375*F.  Grease an 8×8 dish with non-stick spray (or vegetable oil, or butter, I mean, you know how to grease a dish).

In a large mixing bowl, stir together:

• 3-4 overly ripe bananas, mushed up, but a little chunky
• 1/4-1/3 cup* brown sugar, packed
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 3/4 teaspoon sea salt (less if using table salt)
• 1 teaspoon baking power

Slowly stir in:

• 1.5 cups almond milk

Then slowly stir in:

• 3 cups rolled oats
• 1 cup Mix-Ins (you know, maybe 1/2 cup golden raisins and 1/2 cup shredded coconut.  Or maybe 1/2 cup dried cranberries and 1/2 cup pecans. Or… whatever you have in your pantry that you think would go with bananas.)

Pour oat mixture into prepared 8×8 dish.  (Decorate the top with pecans, if you so desire.)  Bake in pre-heated oven for 40-45 minutes.

I like to eat this by warming it up with some almond milk; just a minute in the microwave does it.  Yuuuumm.

What are your oatmeal go-to methods/techniques/flavors, Kaki?  I just realized how boring that sounds.  But, um, I actually do want to know, so… uh, let me know.

–Caitlin

*I find 1/4 cup sugar plenty sweet, buuut that’s after a loooong time of decreasing the sugar I put in my oatmeal.  Soooo, potentially one might want to start at 1/3 cup.