TIP: Flooded Baked Oatmeal

I've mentioned my favorite coffee shop before... It helped inspire my Loaded PB&J Oatmeal! Well, they've inspired me again.

Their menu offers a delicious baked oatmeal. In fact, the first time I experienced baked oatmeal was at their restaurant. And because they're a coffee shop, they serve it in a bowl of steamed milk. Oh LAWD.

Suddenly, I realized the other day that this is brilliant. One of the reasons I prefer stove-top oatmeal over baked oatmeal is that the latter is typically dryer, sometimes resembling an oatmeal cookie more than hot cereal. Maybe the fact that I grew up with Cream of Wheat made me partial to hot, creamy, pudding-like breakfasts.

But to flood your baked oatmeal with steamed milk? Decadent! Unfortunately, I can't make steamed (soy) milk at home because I have neither an espresso machine nor a steaming wand. However, I came up with some better ideas...

Heat about 1/2 cup (or more) of your milk of choice either on the stove or in the microwave. To make it frothy, you can give it a whirl in a blender or using an immersion blender. When your baked oatmeal is ready, transfer it to a bigger bowl, and then add the warm milk to "flood" it.

Zucchini Bread Baked Oatmeal with a Honey-Nut flood.

You can do this with any baked oatmeal. Be creative and flavor your "flood" to best complement your oats! Here are some possibilities:

• Vanilla Bean: Add fresh vanilla bean seeds...or vanilla extract. :)
• Chocolate: Use chocolate milk (I recommend Silk Dark Chocolate Almond Milk) or melt chocolate chips into regular milk
• Strawberry: Blend a few fresh strawberries into your milk
• Chai-spiced: Add cardamom, cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg, or use a brewed chai tea
• Pie-spiced: Add cinnamon, nutmeg, and all-spice, or use apple pie or pumpkin pie spice
• Latte: Add a little brewed coffee (or instant coffee granules) 
• Cafe au Lait: Use mostly brewed coffee with a little bit of milk (reversed proportions of latte)
• Mocha: Use chocolate milk (or melted chocolate chips) and add instant coffee granules (or brewed coffee)
• Peppermint: Add peppermint extract
• Eggnog: Use eggnog, vegan or not! :)
• Honey-Nut: Mix PB2 (or regular peanut butter) into milk, along with some honey and a bit of vanilla extract
• Coconut: Use coconut milk
• Banana: Blend a few chunks of banana into your milk
• Spiced Banana: Blend a few chunks of banana into your milk, and add vanilla extract and cinnamon. You could also try other spices, like nutmeg, allspice, etc.
• Gingerbread: Add molasses, ginger, and cinnamon

**You can also find hundreds of other oatmeal recipes (as well as tons of other meatless recipes) on my Pinterest account!  You can also like The Oatmeal Artist on Facebook. Thanks!