Chocolate Peanut Butter Oatmeal

Aaron's breakfast of preference is oatmeal. This kid should not have any problems with cholesterol. The family we live with every once in awhile would offer to make him oatmeal and add in chocolate chips. Aaron takes after his Gma and LOVES chocolate. The typical bowl of oatmeal I make for Aaron is this:

1/4 - 1/2 c. dry regular or quick oats
double amount of water
craisins
cinnamon
brown sugar to sweeten
milk to cool it down

Well, once he had the chocolate chips, he always wanted them. I usually put enough brown sugar in there that he did not need the extra sugar from the chips. I was playing with cocoa powder in my smoothies at the time and realized that the cocoa powder didn't have any extra sweetener in it, so if he wanted the chocolate flavor, adding the cocoa powder would be a way to do it without adding extra sugar to the mix. He was skeptical at the first introduction, but was soon converted and has requested chocolate oatmeal every day since. Whatever he doesn't finish at breakfast becomes lunch and sometimes a second bowl is requested. I think this is week 3 of this menu.

Gradually I have decreased the sugar amount because I have a hard time believing that chocolate oatmeal for breakfast is a great thing. Matthew made the point that this chocolate oatmeal was like eating a no bake cookie, but as we listed off the ingredients in the cookie, we realized it was missing the peanut butter. Yesterday I decided to make a bowl of chocolate oatmeal for myself but add in peanut butter to see how it would taste. Yep, it's like a no bake cookie for breakfast! YUM!!  With 1/2 c of oatmeal it was a really filling breakfast at only 318 calories without the milk. I really didn't get hungry until the late afternoon where normally I am starving by 11 am. I can easily spend 300 calories on a smoothie and piece of toast and not feel full. This is great for my iron (16) and protein (12) levels too. The only trade-off is the high carbs (and possibly sugars) but I am not worried about that as much as I am about the iron.

So here is my Chocolate Peanut Butter Oatmeal recipe for 318 calories:

1/2 c. rolled oats
1 c. water
2 TB craisins

Cook in microwave for 2 minutes

Add

1 TB brown sugar
1 TB unsweetened cocoa powder
1 TB peanut butter
dash of cinnamon

Mix until well combined. Add milk if desired.

I like the cranberries in it enough that I am thinking that next time I make no bake cookies I might add cranberries to them :)