Portable Chocolate Cherry Overnight Oats

A great breakfast always starts your day on the right track. But what to do when you are travelling? Hotel buffets are typically laden with picks like bagels, muffins, pancakes or standard cereal, which don’t interest me these days. Fruit can be hard to find, and if you have oatmeal, it is usually the quick-cooking oatmeal filled with sugars and flavourings. So what’s a travelling girl to do?

Luckily, I knew I had a refrigerator at my hotel, and I knew the hotel breakfast would include fruit (standard across the Drury chain). I loaded up on apples, bananas and oranges in the morning and then devoured them along with my portable overnight oats. The benefit of nondairy milk in tetrapacks is that I can travel with it very easily before it has been opened (no refrigeration needed).

Before I left home, I created a dry mixture for my overnight oats, including rolled oats and chia seeds. I decided to flavour it with cocoa, dried cherries and a touch of cinnamon. Each night, I added 1/4 cup of the mixture to 1/2 cup of almond milk and let it chill overnight in the fridge. Sometimes I would add more milk the following morning, depending on whether I wanted it more runny. Combined with fresh fruit, I was a happy camper. Healthy breakfasts can be easy while travelling! 🙂 This is also an easier way to create them at home, so that you don’t have to measure out the ingredients every time.

I found the dried tart cherries to work incredibly well with the cocoa flavour, but dried cranberries could work, too – they would just be a bit sweeter.

This is being submitted to this month’s Breakfast Club, featuring whole grains (hosted by me this month).

Portable Chocolate Cherry Overnight Oats

2/3 cup rolled oats
1/4 cup chia seeds
1 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp cocoa or carob powder
1/2 cup dried cherries

almond milk (or other nondairy milk), to taste

1. Combine all the ingredients.

2. The night before, add 1/4-1/2 cup dry mixture to 1/2-1 cup almond milk and let soak overnight in the refrigerator. Mix well.

3. Enjoy the following morning for breakfast. You may need to add more almond milk, to reach your desired consistency.

Serves 2-4.