Grape and Walnut Oatmeal [Guest Post]

There comes a time in every food blogger's life when they see a recipe on the internetz and think, "Damnit. Why didn't I think of that?!" This is what happened when I stumbled upon a few recipes on a blog called Cinnamon Soliloquy. I could quickly tell from Stevie's blog that she was an oatmeal fan and read my blog. The format of her recipes even resembled mine a little bit! Jealous that she had some cool oatmeal ideas that I hadn't thought of yet, I decided to reach out and ask her to write a guest post for me. (This is my first guest post on the blog; there are more in the works!)

Hey!

My name is Stevie and I blog over at Cinnamon Soliloquy - but Lauren has very kindly given me the opportunity to include this guest post in her gorgeous blog! 

I am currently studying Classics (lots of ancient Greek and Latin) at the University of Exeter, Devon in the UK. I love exercise and try to live a balanced, healthy life - which includes what I eat! 

My blog is mainly a way for me to share recipes - the majority of which are oatmeal (or as we call it here in England - porridge!) based. I have eaten oatmeal for as long as I can remember, however for the first 17 years of my life it was the flavoured stuff which came out of a Quaker packet.
When I went to university, however, one morning I ran out of the processed packet stuff and had to improvise (and as I thought at the time make a huge breakfast flavour sacrifice) with bog-standard rolled oats, a banana and cinnamon. Little did I know this was not a sacrifice - but the best thing I had discovered in years - these jumbo oats were so much tastier, chewier... the banana melted into them and sweetened the whole bowl - I stirred in a crazy amount of cinnamon and the result was heavenly. I never looked back! For a while (okay for about 4 months!) I was content to have my banana-cinnamon concoction every single morning, but when I went home for Christmas disaster struck - not a banana in sight! That morning an apple made it into my bowl.. and the experimentations and (sometimes strange) combinations began - I started to collect recipes and now, over a year later, I am gradually sharing them on my blog!

The recipe Lauren chose to make is Grape & Walnut Oatmeal. I came up with the idea a while ago when my mother brought home from her work about eight boxes of over ripe grapes - we had them coming out of our ears! Obviously I never pass the opportunity to make porridge with a new fruit, but grapes on their own seemed a little lack-lustre. So after thinking for some time I decided to pair them with walnuts - the inspiration for this actually came from a salad I had at a restaurant once which had grapes and candied walnuts in it! I think the combination works well so I hope you enjoy it too!

To find the recipe for this oatmeal, head on over to Stevie's blog. I wouldn't change a thing!

**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!