Porridge With Apples

I spent last week in Romania. Beautiful country, lovely people, but I must say I didn't much enjoy the breakfasts. Piles of processed meat do not sit well with me first thing in the morning, especially when they include the remains of yesterday's breakfast, refried! I suppose we shouldn't blame them for being economical. I longed to get back to my favourite autumn breakfast: a bowl of simple, warming porridge.

The best thing about porridge (apart from being healthy, filling, and cheap) is that it is a completely blank canvas. It could carry literally any flavour that took your fancy. To merely sprinkle a little bit of white sugar on top is such a waste! (If you must, crunchy demerara is best.) Beliefs about the perfect porridge method are as strongly held and passionately preached as those about making the perfect cuppa. There are the microwavers, the overnight soakers, the fancy grain users, those who swear by a pinch of salt. There is even an annual porridge-making competition held in Carrbridge in the Scottish Highlands, in which porridge-lovers compete for a golden "spurtle", the traditional Scottish porridge-stirring tool. The organisers of the event have instigated World Porridge Day, held on the 10th of October each year.

I prefer my trusty pink spatula to a golden spurtle, but if I were to enter the competition, this is the porridge I would make. The start of porridge season happens to coincide with the start of apple season, and the two work wonderfully together. Forget the milk/water argument - apple juice gives the porridge a lovely silky consistency, and negates the need for a further topping of sugar.

To my mind, porridge is a warming breakfast soup. If you can stand a spoon up in it, something has gone horribly wrong. Like baked beans, it's best taken from a huge pot which has been simmering away for some time, rather than quickly zapped in the microwave. The extra effort is worth it - and if, like me, you feel a little delicate in the mornings, the gentle putter of porridge on the hob is a far more agreeable soundtrack than the roar of the microwave.

Apple porridge for one

 

1/2 cup rolled oats
3/4 cup apple juice
3/4 cup water
1/2 cup milk
1/2 tsp cinnamon

Add to a small saucepan the oats, apple juice and water. Heat gently, stirring when it starts to thicken. When it comes together and starts to look like porridge, add the milk (if you add it at the start, it could curdle) and stir in the cinammon. If you are lazy about washing up, you could eat from the pan - but I prefer to use a bowl!

I like to top mine with stewed apple, which conveniently takes the same amount of time to prepare as the porridge takes to cook. It's a rare occasion where the microwave does the best job - the pieces of apple cook through but still hold their shape. One peeled, sliced apple needs about 3 minutes of zapping.

Milk or Yoghurt? Homemade granola is grand either way

People are particular about what they'll eat in the morning. I find you can separate cereal eaters with the eponymous question - do you top it with milk or yoghurt? In our house, "Daddy cereal" is simply muesli splashed with milk. Undoubtedly nourishing, but maybe a little bit soggy. Conversely, "Mummy cereal" goes to great lengths to avoid water logging - crunchy, toasted cereal, topped with yoghurt. She fastidiously removes the raisins, leaving a little pile of shrivelled treats for a lucky passer-by.

I'm a fan of fruit for breakfast - I feel cheated if I don't get at least two of my five-a-day. I don't really have a problem with soggy oats, and indeed a little water logging does currants a world of good, but I find a fruit salad floating in milk a bit unappealing. It's yoghurt all the way for me - and muesli just doesn't work with yoghurt. Shop-bought toasted cereal (call it granola, if you will, though I'm doing my best to avoid it) is expensive and full of sugar. So it's good to know that you can make your own for a fraction of the cost - both monetary and calorific.

Fruit - fresh, cooked, tinned or otherwise - should be the star of the show. Sprinkle your cereal over a glorious heap of summer berries, adorn it with silky slices of banana or pile it atop a steaming bowl of stewed apple. Add a luscious dollop of natural yoghurt - low fat if you're feeling virtuous or decadent Greek-style if it's going to be a hard day. And if you are a milk person and you like it soggy, add other liquid too, depending on your fruit - milk works with banana, but dairy isn't the only way - apple juice is divine with strawberries.

Serve with plenty of fruit and natural yoghurt. I'm also eating "hedgerow pulp", left over from jelly-making last year.

Home-made toasted muesli

Though I usually advocate sensible modern measures, cups are rather convenient here, and precise measurement is not required. I don't add dried fruit to mine, but you could add some in after cooking. Makes 8-10 servings. 

4 cups cereal - my favourite breakdown is as follows, but you could use any combination:
2 ¹/₂ cups rolled oats
¹/₂ cup bran flakes
¹/₂ cup rolled rye flakes
¹/₂ cup rolled spelt flakes

¹/₄ cup vegetable oil
1 tbsp runny honey
1 tbsp golden syrup

¹/₃ cup mixed seeds - I use golden linseeds, sunflower, pumpkin and pine nuts
handful mixed nuts, roughly chopped

1. Preheat the oven to 180°. Find a large baking tray and cover with a sheet of greaseproof paper. Put all the cereals into a bowl with the oil, honey and syrup. Roll up your sleeves. With your hands, combine the ingredients, scrunching and squeezing to encourage it into small clumps.
2. Tip onto the prepared baking tray and spread into an even layer. Bake in the hot oven for 10 minutes. It should be starting to brown at the edges. Take it out, sprinkle over the nuts and seeds, and redistribute with a spatula.
3. Bake for another 5-10 minutes to a lovely golden brown colour. Leave to cool and develop some crunch before tipping or spooning into an airtight container. It will keep for a week or so, though it never lasts that long in our house!

Notes: Experiment with the sugars - sometimes I use agave syrup if I've run out of honey or golden syrup; I have also used jam (though with rather unconvincing results, requires more experimentation!). You can save the sheet of greaseproof paper for re-use next time. Mixed nuts and seeds are very good value at Lidl; cereals other than oats are hard to find in the supermarket but easily available from health food shops.