Oat cuisine

Porridge is winter’s super-food refashioned with gourmet flair, writes Sacha van Niekerk

WHETHER it’s crunchy nut crumbles with dustings of coconut sugar or salty-sweet combinations melding spicy cinnamon roasted apples with sharp cheddar cheese and bacon, things are getting marvellously posh in the humble world of porridge.

Where it all began

Evidence unearthed in Grotta Paglicci, Italy, from 32 000 years ago reveals that hunter-gatherers ate oats long before farming was established.

This is the earliest known human consumption of the cereal grain, according to an article published by New Scientist. The Palaeolithic people ground up the wild oats to form a flour which they may have boiled or baked into a simple flat bread.

In more recent times, porridge has been consumed as a staple food in much of the world, including Europe and Africa.

Eaten as a breakfast cereal dish, it’s either cooked and eaten with added flavourings such as sugar, honey or fruit to make a sweet cereal or mixed with spices and vegetables to make a savoury dish. The rise of posh porridge

Porridge, as some of you may remember it, was the bowl of gloopy slop that naughty children turned up their noses at in storybooks.

Too hot or too cold, even in Goldilocks and the Three Bears, it was difficult to get it “just right”.

Touted as a dependable breakfast option, packed with important vitamins, minerals, fibre and antioxidants, porridge has been rediscovered and reinvented by top chefs from around the globe.

From making an appearance on fine dining menus to featuring on the Instagram pages of food bloggers, there’s no end to the deliciously outlandish makeovers this cereal grain is getting.

The streets of New York are home to some of the most innovative restaurants in the world with dishes that chart the course of the global culinary scene.

One such restaurant is Oatmeals, a single-item speciality café focused solely on oatmeal.

Chef and founder Sam Stephens took the leap after a long 12-year journey.

Offering nearly 30 signature savoury and sweet oatmeal bowls and various oat-based pastries, she has revolutionised typical assumptions about oatmeal by showing people that it is anything but oldfashioned.

Across the Atlantic in the UK is Brochan, another restaurant dedicated to porridge, but in ways you’ve never seen before.

It uses only the best local ingredients and always hand-rolled Scottish oats.

They pride themselves on being refined sugar-free and catering for most dietary requirements and all of the dishes on their menu use healthy and nutritious ingredients that promote their ethos of #porridgethatlovesyouback.

If you’re in the mood for a wholesome bowl of posh porridge, look no further.

Here are three recipes perfect for warming up this winter.