Fruity Baked Steel Cut Oats

I’ve been making this recipe for over a year now…and it’s become one of my go-to breakfasts. For us, it ranks right up there with Baked Oatmeal and Sweet Potato Oatmeal. We all LOVE it! It’s so easy to customize to your desire and it works with whatever is in season. I found the general idea online and made my own version. 😉

Steel cut oats are tricky…if you don’t cook them just right, they’re crunchy. I’m not sure about you, but crunchy oatmeal is just not cool – not cool at all. If you expect them to taste like regular oatmeal, you’re going to be sadly disappointed. They do have a bit of a bite to them, but they should not be crunchy when cooked. For us, we had to learn to like them – and buddy, do we like them!

First, you need to decide on a fruit…it really doesn’t matter what you choose. Okay, so it does matter. Be smart. This recipe would not work well with watermelon. Think to yourself, “self, do I like this fruit hot?” If not, then you shouldn’t use it here. Hot watermelon sorta makes me want to yak.

I’ve used peaches, apples, blueberries, cherries, and pears. They’re all delicious! However, I am partial to the peaches. You can even use frozen fruit – don’t thaw before you use it. Just sock that puppy in there frozen. Booya.

In the bottom of a 6 ounce ramekin, put your chopped fruit. As a rule of thumb, you’ll use half an apple, pear, or peach. For berries, just eyeball it. You might want to grease the ramekin too. For some reason, I always forget that step and end up singing “scrubby dubby!!” while washing dishes. And no, that’s not a song…that’s just something I say. Yeah – I know.

Pour ¼ cup steel cut oats over the fruit. Did I mention this only makes one serving? So, you can make as many as you need for your family…or as many ramekins you have.

Over the oats, pour ½ cup milk. That’s it. Stick them into a 400 degree oven for about 30 minutes.

So, here’s the tricky part. Notice I said ABOUT. For some reason, out of the blue, sometimes it takes mine 40 minutes. I have no idea why. It’s usually on days that I’m in a hurry. So, note to self and readers – don’t make this on days when you’re in a hurry…it’ll take 40 minutes.

I do know that if using frozen fruit, it can take longer to bake…that’s because of the water content in the fruit. I did figure that out. The other thing? Still not sure about it – Murphy’s Law of Stacy Doesn’t Want to be Late.

Note: I like to put my ramekins down into another dish before baking…because sometimes it bakes over and causes a mess. This also only happens on days when I’m running late.

Now, here’s the fun part. I like to serve these with peanut butter and maple syrup…the breakfast of champions. Forget Wheaties, just give me the peanut butter and syrup. Put a blob of peanut butter down in those hot oats and magic will happen. Pour some maple syrup over it and rainbows will appear at your kitchen table. It’s beautiful, man…just beautiful. But make sure it’s REAL syrup. You don’t want any of that fake stuff messing up your breakfast.

Breakfast is served. Booya.