I made Samoa Cookie Baked oatmeal with date caramel and no “added” sugar! I love Samoa Cookies; they are perhaps my favorite Girl Scout Cookies. Baked oatmeal is my favorite go-to breakfast meal prep.
This Samoa Cookie Baked oatmeal was more complicated than most of the baked oatmeals I usually make. It’s a good thing to bake on a weekend:
- I wanted the coconut to be “toasted” like the cookie, so I toasted the coconut in the oven for five minutes.
- I made date caramel sauce for sweetening and topping the oatmeal.
- Samoa Cookies obviously need a chocolate drizzle on top, so I did that too.
I bet this would taste really good if you used coconut milk instead of cow’s milk, but I didn’t have any coconut milk so I used a combination of skim milk from a cow and coconut extract.
Baked oatmeal probably reheats well, but I’ve never reheated it. I just grab it right out of the fridge and eat it cold; it’s like cake for breakfast. Grab & go breakfasts are important to me, because if I didn’t have breakfast meal prepped and ready in the fridge, I wouldn’t eat it. Baked oatmeal is awesome because it is delicious, filling, convenient, and easy to meal prep.
Samoa Cookie Baked Oatmeal
Ingredients
Date Caramel:
- 8 medjool dates
- ½ cup milk of your choice
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Baked Oatmeal:
- ¾ cup toasted coconut
- 1½ cups unsweetened applesauce
- 1 egg
- ¼ cup egg whites
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ½ teaspoon coconut extract
- ¼ teaspoon cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 1½ cup milk of your choice
- 2½ cups uncooked old fashioned rolled oats
- ½ cup chocolate chips
Chocolate Topping
- 2 tablespoon chocolate chips
- ¼ teaspoon canola oil or coconut oil
Instructions
- Make the date caramel: Put the dates, ½ cup of milk and 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract into a blender or food processor and blend until the dates liquefy. Set aside.
- Toast the coconut: Preheat the oven to 350 °F and line a small baking sheet with parchment paper. Sprinkle the coconut in an even layer on the baking sheet and toast in the hot oven for about 3 minutes. Stir, and continue to toast for 2 to 3 more minutes until coconut is lightly golden-brown.
- Turn the oven up to 375 °F and lightly spray a 9×13-inch baking dish with nonstick spray.
- Reserve about 2 tablespoons of date caramel for topping. Whisk the rest of the date caramel with the applesauce in a large bowl.
- Beat the egg and egg white into the applesauce/date mixture.
- Whisk in the baking powder, vanilla extract, coconut extract, cinnamon and salt.
- Stir in the milk
- Stir in the oats
- Stir in ½ cup chocolate chips
- Put the baking dish in the oven and bake at for 45 minutes, until the oatmeal is golden-brown at the edges. Oatmeal is done cooking when a toothpick/knife/skewer inserted into the center of the oatmeal comes out clean.
Make the chocolate topping
- Put 2 tablespoons of chocolate chips in a small bowl and microwave on high heat for 15 seconds. Give it a stir, and microwave for another 10 seconds. Stir, and microwave for another 10 seconds until the chocolate chips are about 85% melted.
- When the chocolate chips are about 85% melted, add the canola oil or coconut oil and microwave another 10 seconds until fully melted.
- After the oats come out of the oven, drizzle the chocolate topping and the reserved 2 tablespoons of date caramel on top of the oatmeal.
