Let's start with something simple - just a few ingredients, minimal preparation and minimal cooking time.
Recipe: Instant Oats
This is a laughably simple recipe, scaled down from A Girl Called Jack. The amounts below make 1 generous adult portion of porridge, you can scale it up for more people, or if you want to prepare a whole week's worth.
Equipment
Tablespoon or scales
Microwave safe bowl with lid/cover
Microwave or kettle
Ingredients
5 tbsp rolled oats (approx 30g)
2 tbsp dried milk powder (approx 10g)
Sweetener to taste
Water
Instructions
Mix all the ingredients in your bowl and add at least as the same volume of water as dried ingredients, I recommend a ratio of two parts water to one part oat mix, but feel free to vary depending on how thick you like your porridge.
Make sure your bowl is at least 2-3 times bigger than the contents! It will bubble up quite furiously, and cleaning sticky oatmeal off the insides of your microwave (or worse, the work canteen's microwave...) is never fun.
Cover loosely and microwave for about 2-3 minutes on high, stir, then microwave in 30 second intervals to your preferred temperature and texture.
Alternatively if you don't have access to a microwave, fill with just boiled water and cover for about the same amount of time.
If you sweeten your porridge with sugar, you can add that to the dry mix ahead of time, otherwise just swirl in some honey/syrup/jam once it's ready.
The cost
30g Sainsbury's Scottish Porridge Oats @ £1 per kilo = 3p
10g Sainsbury's Basics Dried Skimmed Milk Powder @ £2.80 per kilo = 2.8p
Tablespoon of Sainsbury's Basics Honey (15g) @ £2.90 per kilo = 4.35p
Total = 10.15p per portion
A healthy, filling breakfast for 10p per portion (or 7p if you sweeten it with jam instead)! You should get at least 50 portions from one bag of oats (1.5kg), though if you're as generous with the honey as I am, you'll run out after about 20 or so portions.
The Verdict
This is a no brainer. A hot bowl of porridge on a cold morning is a great way to start your day, and has the added bonus of being something you can easily prepare at work.
I honestly can't taste the difference between this and the sachets, and no wonder, because it's exactly the same ingredients! The markup is an absolute disgrace. It is just as convenient as a sachet, no standing over the hob continually stirring. And for those who need to watch their sugar intake, you can control just how much sweetener goes in.
Oats keep well and have a lot of uses in the kitchen, so don't be afraid to buy the bigger bag - it costs less per kilo and we'll have no trouble using them.
