Coconut oatmeal with blueberries and almonds

I used to hate oatmeal because I thought there was only one kind: the instant kind. I found it pasty and bland as itself (it was okay in cookies.). But then I watched “Good Eats,” featuring my hero Alton Brown and watched him make this recipe, and I was like, “I’ve been eating oatmeal wrong this whole time!”

Steel-cut oats are oats that have been broken down in a steel mill. The pieces are kernel-like and still hard. Compared to rolled oats, which are the same kind of oats but are flattened thinly instead of cut, steel-cut oats have a lower surface-to-mass ratio. That’s why steel-cut oats require a longer cooking time compared to rolled oats—the hot liquid has more oat layers to penetrate and soften. Incidentally, instant oatmeal are rolled oats to the 10th power (I made that up; not mathematically accurate), that is, rolled super, super thinly.

I’m not sure steel cut oats are more nutritious than rolled oats. Some people say they are. I just like them better than rolled oats because of texture and taste. To me, steel-cut oats are more substantial and bouncier, and they have a nuttier aroma.

This recipe is dairy-free. I like coconut a lot because a lot of Vietnamese desserts are flavored with coconut. Just tastes like home. Plus, I had a frozen brick of coconut milk taking of space in my freezer—coconut milk has a high amount of fat in it, so it goes rancid in the fridge after a few days. I freeze my extras to prevent that from happening.

You can obviously have this with whichever toppings you want. I like nuts no matter what because I’m addicted to the flavor of nuts. (That’s what she said <— Sorry.) And I like the crunch.

I also like my oatmeal on the softer, runnier side, so there’s a fair amount of liquid in this recipe. Feel free to scale back a little if you want oatmeal with more heft. I also like sugar. So there is a good amount of sugar in the recipe. That’s why the nutritional value of these oats doesn’t really matter to me. I know I’m going to ruin them with fat and sugar.

Coconut oatmeal with blueberries and almonds

Prep time: 10 mins

Cook time: 30 mins

Total time: 40 mins

Serves: 4

Not the instant stuff! This oatmeal will take awhile to make, but hopefully what it lacks in speed of preparation, it’ll make up for in taste? Dairy-free

Ingredients

1 tablespoon coconut oil
1 cup steel cut oats
3 cups water
1 cup coconut milk
4 tablespoons cane sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
Fresh blueberries
Roasted almonds

Instructions

Melt the coconut oil in a medium to large sauce pan over medium-high heat.
Add in the steel cut oils and fry/saute them in the oil for 30 seconds, until they darken slightly in color (golden brown) and smell nutty. Just don’t let them burn!
Add in water, coconut milk, sugar, and salt. Stir. Bring the mixture to a soft boil.
Once it reaches a boil, lower the heat to low, cover the pan with a lid, and let the oatmeal simmer for another half an hour, until tender.
Serve warm topped with blueberries and almonds.