I love a meal of good honest oatmeal porridge. So warm and comforting in the cold mornings. So safe and secure. And yet easily – oh so boring. Especially when eaten at almost every breakfast in the cold season, as the tradition goes in many households here in Finland. Oatmeal porridge with butter. Oatmeal porridge with berries. Oatmeal porridge with milk. Oh my dear porridge, I love you, but we really need to spice things up if we want to save our relationship!

And so came the spices. Last week I got to taste this really interesting variation of oatmeal porridge in a PR event. Oatmeal was cooked with coconut milk and served with licorice sauce. The combination was so darn delicious! I had to try it at home and make my own version of it.

I cooked the oatmeal in a mixture of oat milk and coconut milk with some vanilla, and also added a ripe banana in slices. I topped the whole thing with licorice chia jam.
Oatmeal and licorice are both inherently Finnish flavours and they match beautifully with coconut and banana. There's north and south combined. There's something familiar and something surprising. Not dull anymore! This one truly perked up my porridge relationship and made the love stronger.

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COCONUT OAT PORRIDGE WITH LICORICE CHIA JAM

Coconut Oat porridge with licorice chia jam

Porridge:

• 2 cups oat milk (or other dairy free milk)
• 2 tbsp coconut milk
• 1 cup oat meal
• 1 sliced ripe banana
• ¼ tsp cardamom
• ½ tsp vanilla seeds or vanilla powder
• 2 tsp almond butter

Licorice jam:

• 1 cup oat milk
• 4 tbsp chia seeds
• 1 tbsp grated licorice root extract stick or black licorice root powder
• 1-2 tbsp of liquid organic honey
• a pinch of vanilla powder /vanilla seeds

Place oats and oat milk in pan, stir well. Bring to the boil and stir. Add cardamom, vanilla and almond butter. Boil for 2-5 minutes until oats are thick and creamy. Prepare the licorice jam.

Pour the oat milk in a small bowl and stir in the chia seeds. Let sit for about 10 minutes. Stir in the honey and licorice root powder. Stir and let the liquorice powder melt into the mixture.

Pour porridge into bowl. Top with licorice jam. Serve and enjoy!

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