Christmas
Old-School Bircher Muesli
- Serves 4
Author Notes
Here’s a slightly adapted re-work of the original recipe, which called for sweetened condensed milk and quite a bit of lemon juice. This makes 4 servings. If you are making this for just one person, or two, prepare and store the oats and flaxseed separately from the apples and lemon; always add the nuts immediately before serving. Please note that you should start this the night before, to allow the oats and flaxseed to absorb the water completely. Don’t worry about the apple’s discoloring if making this ahead, as once it’s mixed in with the other ingredients, no one will notice. This recipe provides the perfect reason to make your own sweetened condensed milk, now. (I used the method in the DIY column here on Food52, using raw sugar, which gives it the color and flavor of a caramel.) The higher ratio of fruit and lemon juice to oats than most current recipes makes this light and refreshing. Enjoy!! ;o) —AntoniaJames
Ingredients
-
¼ cup rolled oats (or barley flakes, or multigrain flakes)
-
¼ cup chopped toasted almonds, walnuts, pecans or hazelnuts (measured after chopping)
-
¼ cup ground flaxseed
-
1 ¼ cup very hot filtered water (or almond or other nut milk to make this vegan – please see note below.)
-
4 medium apples
-
Juice of two lemons (4 tablespoons)
-
4 tablespoons sweetened condensed milk (See note below, but do consider making your own for this.)
Directions
- In a small heavy skillet, toast the oats or barley flakes, etc. over medium heat just until they start to color a bit. Remove from the pan immediately and put into a medium bowl with the flaxseed and the water. Stir well. Let sit overnight. (If preparing this further in advance, refrigerate it, covered.)
- Toast the nuts in the same skillet and finely chop.
- Cut the apples in half from top to bottom. Remove the core and blossom end – I find that a melon baller works perfectly for this – and grate, unpeeled. The grating disk on your food processor was designed just for this, so use it, if you have one.
- Mix the grated apple with the lemon juice. Put into a medium sized bowl. Cover and refrigerate if not eating right away.
- When ready to serve, mix the oats and flaxseed into the grated apple and lemon, along with the sweetened condensed milk; stir to blend.
- When serving, top each bowl with one tablespoon of nuts.
- Enjoy! ;o)
- If you don’t want to use sweetened condensed milk, use 2 tablespoons of plain regular yogurt into which you’ve stirred one tablespoon of maple syrup or flavorful honey. If you don’t want to use yogurt (or cashew cheese), you could also use almond milk; in that case, use 1 ¼ cup, gently heated until it’s very hot, to replace the hot water for soaking the oats and flaxseed; add a tablespoon of maple syrup or an equivalent amount of whatever other sweetener you like.
- If making just one serving, divide each of the ingredients by 4, using 5 tablespoons of hot water or almond milk.
See what other Food52ers are saying.