Saturday, January 2, 2010

Cinnamon Apple Oatmeal

Oatmeal in a slow cooker?  Why even bother?   Because the cooker takes a pretty average breakfast meal to completely delicious.  I mean, the best oatmeal you'll ever taste.

This is perfect when you have overnight guests or just for a cozy Saturday breakfast.  Heck, you can even make it for any day of the week.  Who doesn't love waking up to breakfast already made?

It's key to use a small slow cooker (1 1/2 to 2 1/2 quarts).  Anything larger and the oatmeal will overcook. 

I got this from Not Your Mother's Slow Cooker Cookbook.

Cinnamon Apple Oatmeal
Serves 2

1 cup old-fashioned rolled oats or thick-cut rolled oats
2 tablespoons light or dark brown sugar
1/2 to 3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon, to your taste
Pinch of salt
2 1/2 cups water or a combo of water and apple juice
1 1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 medium apple or pear, peeled, cored and chopped

1. Combine all the ingredients in the slow cooker.  Cover and cook on LOW for 7-9 hours or overnight, or on HIGH for 2-3 hours.

2. Stir the oatmeal well and serve with milk or cream.

Enjoy!

4 comments:

  1. I've done this with 2 c. of applesauce and a cup of water in place of the juice+water+apple. Really easy and delicious.

    ReplyDelete
  2. this sounds yummy... I love oatmeal will have to try this!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I struggled with crock-pot oatmeal for a long time- it always cooked too long and burned to the sides of the crock. I bought a smaller crock-pot and ended up plugging it into a timer (the kind you might use to turn lights in your house on/off if you were out of town.) It worked but was kind of a nuisance.

    Then recently I stumbled across the best, easiest way that makes them PERFECT each time: I put the oats into a smaller oven-proof bowl, then set that into the crock-pot and fill the crock with water about midway up the bowl. It's basically making a waterbath for the oatmeal and it never burns or sticks. Clean up is sooo much easier!

    (I just googled and found this with pictures to illustrate what I mean: http://annkroeker.wordpress.com/2008/03/25/overnight-crockpot-steel-cut-oatmeal/)

    ReplyDelete