Oat Cups (Vegan, GF, High Protein, Nut-free, Soy-free)

Oat Cups

     So, I love having oatmeal for breakfast. It's either oatmeal or a bowl of nice cream 99% of the time. If you've seen my other recipes, you may have come upon one for "chocolate protein oatmeal" which is one of the best oatmeal concoctions there is! (I'll link it HERE if you want to check it out.)
     One issue with these breakfasts though, is they're tough to take on the go. If you happen to have access to a microwave, you can just heat up the oatmeal and it's all good, but when I need to have breakfast on the go, I typically don't have the luxury of a microwave. I'm a competitive bagpiper, which means that every couple weeks in the Spring, Summer, and Fall I travel around the U.S., Canada, and sometimes even Scotland to get to competitions. For example, tomorrow I'm driving out to Look Park in Massachusetts, and I have to leave super early in the morning and spend the entire day in a park. No microwaves for me. So in order to have a nutritious and healthy breakfast without spending a ton of money, I came up with these little things that I'm calling: oat cups. 

     They're kind of like muffins, kind of like oatmeal, and just completely adorable. They're all chocolate flavoured (like my typical bowl of oatmeal) but 6 of them are filled with peanut butter, and the other 6 are filled with berries. Also, they're PACKED with protein. 

     They're absolutely going to become a staple in my diet, especially now that I'm heading off to grad school in about a month! 3 or 4 of these will make up a meal, or you can just bring one or two of them along and pair it with a smoothie! So many options for these sweet (and cute) little blobs.

Yield: 12 oat cups (3 or 4 meal servings)

Ingredients:

2 cups of rolled oats (blended into a flour)

3 scoops of MyProtein chocolate protein powder

2 3/4 cups of water or almond milk (I used water)

1 ripe banana, mashed

3 tbsp cacao or cocoa powder

2 tsp baking powder

Peanut butter

Fresh or frozen berries

Instructions:

1. Blend the oats into a flour and place in a medium mixing bowl. Combine with the protein powder, cacao, and baking powder.

2. Add the water and mashed banana and mix well.

3. Fill half of one section of a muffin tin with the mixture. (Pictured below)

4. Layer 1 tbsp of peanut butter or a few berries in top.

5. Cover the peanut butter or berries with more batter. (Fill the muffin tin)

6. Bake for 25 minutes at 375 degrees F.

(Being filled with peanut butter)

(Being filled with berries)

They may not be the most attractive things in the world, but they're PACKED with protein, complex carbs, healthy fats, and antioxidants. How can you go wrong? The peanut butter filled ones taste like chocolate peanut butter cups, and the berry filled ones are so refreshing and tasty! They travel well and can be stored in the fridge for a few days. I'd recommend toasting them after taking them out of the fridge.

(Chillin')

The berry filled cups have 8 grams of protein each, and the peanut butter ones have 12 grams each. For me, a meal consists of 4 of these, which is anywhere from 32-48 grams of plant-based protein. That's essentially 100% of my daily recommended amount of protein in breakfast, with ZERO animal products. 

I don't think any of you out there need to be consuming 100 grams of protein a day unless you're bodybuilding or lifting, but this goes to show that it's easy to do on a healthy vegan diet!

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If you make this recipe, make sure to tag me on Instagram at @ThatPiperGirll

I believe that healthy, plant-based recipes should be available to ALL people, and that's why I started a blog instead of releasing a recipe book, which was highly requested among my Facebook friends and Instagram followers. If you do want to support me, you can make monthly or one time donations on my Patreon account. I thank you in advance for your support!