New breakfast ideas wanted or, can old oatcakes learn new tricks?

What do you eat for breakfast? Is the first meal of the day a rollercoaster ride of mind-bending new dishes, or more same old, same old?

You may be able to guess which one it is for me. In the wintertime, it's porridge all the way, and when the sun shines, it's oatcakes with something on top. 

I like oatcakes, I really do - we've been together for years. We've been through ups and downs, but you know - sometimes I feel a bit, well, bored. It's got to the stage where I need oatcakes to try something different, y'know dress up a bit, in order to keep me interested.

I mean hummus is fine, but it's a bit vanilla, isn't it? I want something that will set pulses racing, not send me sleep.

My first new oatcake attempt was actually a bit of leftover mole from a batch I made from Veganomicon - mostly a mix of tomatillos, pumpkin seeds and some herbs. It had originally been destined for keeping some tofu and rice and beans company, but it worked really well the next day on oatcakes. Voila:

Next up was a recipe from Green Kitchen Stories, the cookbook by the authors behind the blog of the same name. It's veggie rather than vegan, but all the vegan recipes are marked and there's many more that could easily be veganised.

The spread here is a simple mix of grilled red peppers, sunflower seeds and a bit of cayenne. It was nice, but not powerful enough to reignite my erstwhile love of oatcakes.

This is another Green Kitchen Stories pâté recipe I tried, a really simple mix of sundried tomatoes, walnuts and sage leaves.

It came out a weird pink colour that wasn't altogether appetising:


I loved all the ingredients in there, but I found the end result a bit too sweet from all the tomatoes. It needed a sharper touch so balance the overall flavour - maybe a bit of lemon juice to cut through it a bit?

My last attempt at reinvigorating my oatcakes of a morning was an attempt to make edamame hummus. I remembered buying some rather nice ready made stuff from Trader Joes when I was in San Francisco a million years ago, and decided I'd try and make some at home (what with the nearest Trader Joes being an Atlantic away.)

 

I blended some edamame, tahini, lime juice and olive oil together and hoped for the best. It was fine, but not a patch on Trader Joes - where did I go wrong people? Hints gratefully accepted.

And that's my four attempts to make breakfast a bit different. Turns out, I liked none of them quite as much as I like baba ganoush, my usual staple, and one which I've been consuming in superhuman quantities as the English aubergine season comes to an end.

Alas, autumn has come, and baba ganoush is off the menu for another year. It looks like it's back to the drawing board - and in the meantime, back to the hummus!