Skip to main content

Bircher for One


Joy the Baker raised a crucial point about breakfast a few years ago. Most breakfast recipes out there can't be scaled to feed just one. Even if you add just one egg, you will end up with way too much batter for crepes or pancakes. Joy solved the problem with pancakes, and possibly waffles with her iconic post titled The Single Lady Pancake.

I've now encountered a similar problem with birchermuesli. A Swiss breakfast staple, bircher is a delicious combination of uncooked oats left to soak overnight, apples, nuts and dried fruits. The issue here is the apple. Even the smallest apple will be too much for one serving and you can't leave these apples lying around, they brown too quickly.

So here's my solution. The night before, measure out 3 tbsp oats in a large bowl. Add enough apple juice to cover the oats. This will impart the traditional apple flavour to your bircher without you grating a real apple. The next morning, pick a fruit that goes with oats. It has to be something sweet, not tart and preferably small enough to scale down. Ideal, as you can see, will be grapes. Or berries. Add that to your oats and then anything else that catches your fancy. I like the bite of nuts so I added almonds and then some cranberries to make it an indulgent breakfast. Mix it all in and if you find the muesli to be too thick, you can add a bit more apple juice or even some yogurt.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Hello !
My name is Phuong, currently working for Foodpanda India with Food Delivery Service via website: www.foodpanda.in. I would like to take this possibility to introduce Foodpanda to you and hope to cooperate with you. Please let me know your thoughts about it. Contact me: p.le@foodpanda.com. Phuong
Anonymous said…
Hello !
My name is Phuong, currently working for Foodpanda India with Food Delivery Service via website: www.foodpanda.in. I would like to take this possibility to introduce Foodpanda to you and hope to cooperate with you. Please let me know your thoughts about it. Contact me via: p.le@foodpanda.com. Phuong

Popular posts from this blog

Kadhi Chawal

I just can't think of what to write today. That's what my absolute favorite meal does to me, I just want to stop talking and dig right in. So I won't ramble and go straight on the recipe for kadhi. First, make the pakoras that would go in the kadhi. Slice an onion lengthwise. Make a batter with 1/2 cup chickpea flour (besan), salt, red chilli powder and water. Dip onions in this batter and deep fry until crisp. Keep aside. Now blend 1 cup yogurt and 1/3 cup besan into a paste. Add 3-4 cups water to make a very thin blend. Heat a tbsp of oil in a pan. Add a tsp each of mustard seeds, cumin seeds, ajwain (carom seeds) and methre (fenugreek seeds). Let splutter for a few seconds. Now add a large onion, cut lengthwise into thin slices and cook until browned lightly. Pour in the yogurt/besan mix and add 1 tsp turmeric powder, 1 tsp salt and 1/2 tsp red chilli powder. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat and let simmer for at least half an hour. You have to stir this occasio...

Bibimbap

This is the reason I love taking part in Taste & Create . There is so much new to learn and try when you meet new partners. This month, I am visiting Kitschow in Vancouver for a course in Asian cooking. She also tries a lot of other cuisines, but wok is her favorite way to cook. I first thought I'd find very little vegetarian choice at her place. But as luck would have it, she has recently done a lot of vegetarian cooking and eating for lent and I had a virtual rainbow to pick from. Everything looked so delicious it was tough to pick one. I picked the one with the cutest name : Bibimbap . Bibimbap is a Korean rice, usually topped with beef and vegetables but Kitschow made a vegan version for Lent. The recipe has three parts. First you cook the rice. Then, when it's almost done but is still moist, you arrange vegetables on top so it looks colorful and pretty. For the vegan version, Kitschow just put raw veggies there and let them cook in the steam. But I liked the i...

Dukkah

Talk about myths busted. I went to Dubai planning to buy zat'ar, the fragrant herb and spice mix. And Dukkah, the interesting blend of nuts and spices. Not sumac, because I still have a pack left in my fridge. So zat'ar was easy - every Carrefour supermarket had that one. But no one had dukkah and I was like, how can they not have dukkah? It's a middle eastern thing, right! But well, they don't sell dukkah in Dubai, so I came back and armed with recipes from 10-odd blogs (all roughly the same), I set to make my own. The key to making dukkah is : line up all your ingredients, toast each of them separately in a heavy non-stick pan till they are fragrant and lightly roasted, then put everything in a blender and grind coarsely. This is your dukkah. Now dip your bread in olive oil, then dip it in dukkah and indulge. A final word of warning: this can be highly addictive. And finally, my list of ingredients: 1/4 cup almonds 2 tbsp coriander seeds 1 1/2 tbsp sesame...