I dream about cake and food quite a lot – I’m not sure if that’s normal or the epitome of weirdness, but it happens. In fact I seem to only have two types of adventures in my dreams at the moment: great ones about food, and terrifying nightmares about my impending wedding (I say impending, it’s not imminent yet: it’s in September!). But the other day, my dream involved my chocolate and mint cupcakes (they were growing on trees!) and when I woke up in the morning, I was craving something chocolatey and minty. They say that your cravings mean your body is missing something on a nutrient level… but it was early and I was not feeling like translating “chocolate and mint” into nutrition terms.
However – I didn’t have any cupcakes to hand, and nor would I eat my for breakfast generally speaking (I say generally because I have been known to take a bite of cupcakes first thing when staying in hotels…) so I decided to incorporate it into one of my favourite breakfasts: porridge! Also known as oatmeal… I use those two words interchangeably so I’m sorry if that’s kind of confusing! I happened to have fresh mint in the fridge, so chocolate & mint porridge seemed like a natural fit.
After Eight inspired chocolate & mint porridge!
This was inspired by a British classic: After Eight mints. We used to have them a lot around Christmas – I don’t even know if they’re available during the rest of the year! Are they? Feel free to enlighten me if you enjoy those dark chocolate and mint delights all year round!
But, we used to have them after dinners and, drama of do you leave the wrapper in the box or not aside, I also remember the delicious bite of mint cream wrapped in the slightly bitter, thin chocolate layer…. I always had several more than ‘a few’, can you tell?
(And yes, I used to leave the wrappers in the box!)
In this recipe I use Naturya choc blend, which I won in a Twitter competition (of all places!) – this isn’t a sponsored post, as well as cocoa powder. If you don’t have any to hand, just sub in the same amount cocoa powder, a dash more vanilla extract and a little more sweetener to taste. I like to use the choc blend because it’s a combination of not just chocolate, but also lucuma, maca and vanilla powders so it tastes great and is packed with potassium, magnesium, fibre, amino acids and protein! It’s basically my way of adding a little extra ‘kick’ into my healthy porridge breakfast… but like I said, just sub cocoa powder and you’ll be fine!
Chocolate and mint oatmeal (with blueberries)
Luci Rebecca, Made by Luci
- Prep: 2 minutes
- Cook: 5 minutes
- Total: 7 minutes
- Serves 1
- Calories 231
Ingredients
- 1/3 cup (~35g) oats
- 1 tsp (~3g) chia seeds (optional)
- 1 tsp (~3g) cocoa powder
- 1 heaped tsp (~5g) Naturya choc blend (optional, sub with add another teaspoon of cocoa)
- 1 tbsp fresh mint, chopped
- 1 cup (240ml) water
- 1 tbsp sugar free vanilla syrup
- 1/4 tsp peppermint extract
- 100g frozen blueberries (fresh is fine too)
Directions
- Add all the ingredients, except for the blueberries, to a saucepan and bring to boil.
- Reduce to a gentle simmer and stir often until your desired consistency is reached.
- Stir in the blueberries and cook for a minute more to warm them through.
- Serve and enjoy! I like to top mine with more fresh mint, blueberries (at least!)
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