2022-04-28

Modified oatmeal breakfast pastry recipe

"The Meal Prep Manual" website has some great recipies for oatmeal-based, surprisingly healthy, cake-like pastries. Of the recipies listed in that link, I've tried the Lemon Blueberry Baked Oatmeal, Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Baked Oatmeal, and Strawberries and Cream Baked Oatmeal. What's nice about these recipies is that they're all quite similar: after you familiarize yourself with one recipe fairly well, it becomes easy to generalize to other flavors/fruits/ingredients. They're all great, but I've made a few minor modifications to the ingredients that seem to have more than a minor improvement in the taste. Without these modifications, I found the finished product to be somewhat bland and underwhelming; the food was just fine, but I found myself tired of eating at the end of each serving.

Here's the original video for the Lemon Blueberry Baked Oatmeal:

And here is my generalized ingredients list, with modifications (editorial comments in italics):

3 cups (240 g) old fashioned oats

2 scoops (60 g) 3 scoops (90 g) vanilla protein powder. If you're not wanting high protein, sure, leave it at 2 scoops. But I'm always looking for a little extra protein in my diet, and you probably won't even notice the taste difference here.

1 tsp (4 g) baking powder

3 cups (450 g) 350-400 g fruit of choice (frozen is fine). Holy cow 450 g is a ton.* I like fruit as much as the next guy (though apparently not as much as The Meal Prep Manual guy), but 450 g is just a bit overpowering.

2 tbsp (42 g) maple syrup honey. Not saying "don't use maple syrup." It was simply the case that I've only had honey and not syrup each time I've made these dishes. But you should be pleased to know that honey seems to work just fine! If anything, feel free to go a little heavy if you're not counting calories.

1 tbsp (14 g) butter. No one will complain if you use 1.5-2 tbsp butter. I microwave the butter and honey together to help them mix in with the other ingredients.

10 tbsp (150 g) liquid egg whites or 3 eggs

2 cups (480 g) skim milk. 1% works fine too.

2 tbsp (20 g) sugar or 1 tsp (4 g) splenda 3 packets stevia. I think each packet is about 2 g, which would mean his original recipe calls for only 2 packets. Just one more packet will really help boost the sweetness out of the bland zone, while still not making it so sweet to not feel healthy. While following his instructions, I use 1 packet in the main [batter], and mix 2 packets into the cream cheese (see next).

4 oz (113 g) 5 1/3 oz (150 g) plain cream cheese. I buy an 8 oz container of cream cheese and use about 2/3 of the container. 4 oz is just not enough. Trust me, at only 4 oz, you'll finish each portion saying, "If only it had a little more cream cheese..." My recommendation hits the cream cheese spot, while still not making it overpoweringly cheesy or feeling unhealthy.

[Any extra ingredients he includes in specific recipies, primarily for topper/finisher sprinkle-ons]

I have no suggested changes to the original preparation and baking instructions. 

He says the 9x13" pan and his ingredients list makes 6 servings. I have a healthy appetite, but have never been a big breakfast eater; so I find that I easily get 8 servings out of this. Refrigerates and reheats in microwave well.

All rights and intellectual property attributed to MealPrepManual.com.

*Technically speaking, 1,000,000 g (1,000 kg) would be a ton of fruit.