A Versitile Topping

Here's a Bah-Humbug for you - for Christmas morning breakfast we had....oatmeal.

THAT's a bit anti-climactic.  I mean, here's the Breakfast Blogger serving oatmeal on the day of Christ's birth?

The justifications:
1. Oatmeal happens to be Cool Guy's food jag for now.
2. Time was tight.  Two of us were serving at 9:00 Mass, and the boys SLEPT IN until we woke them a little after 7:00.

There's nothing wrong with oatmeal at all, but it's just not that festive.  I decided to try dressing it up a little for Christmas.  I checked in one of my trusty tech manuals, A Real American Breakfast, and came across a topping idea.  You take equal parts of softened butter, sugar, nuts, and dried fruit and mix them all up together.  I used brown sugar, pecan bits, and dried cranberries.

This made serving the oatmeal so easy!  Everything but the milk was in one bowl, and we only had to scoop out what we wanted and stir it in.  Cool Guy picked out the cranberries, but I would include them again, for no other reason than that they add some festive color to an otherwise greyish-brownish dish.  But I liked the cranberries beyond just the color.

Now here's the cool part: I woke too early again this morning and began thinking breakfast.  What to have, what to have?  Eureka!  We have some apples that have been sitting awhile on the counter, not being eaten because of the wonderful oranges.  These are largish apples and are a little softer than we like.  So I baked them and filled the centers with the leftover oatmeal topping.

Wow, what a fantastic breakfast!  What a fantastic idea, if I do say so myself!

One topping, two breakfasts, I love it.

The next time I do this, I think I'll try adding some cinnamon to the topping, or a mix of cinnamon and nutmeg.  I could add other fruit, even some fresh diced apples, maybe some maple syrup in place of some of the brown sugar.  The possiblilities are endless.  Anyway, here's what I did.

Oatmeal Topping/Baked Apple Filling
(From A Real American Breakfast)
6 Tablespoons of each:
butter softened
brown sugar
small pecan pieces
dried cranberries

Baked Apples
1.Take the peel off the top of the apples, about 1/4 way down.
2. Core the apples.  This is usually the hard part, but this time I tried using a melon baller to scoop out the core, and it worked well on soft apples.
3. Place the apples in a pan with sides just big enough for them and fill them with the topping.
4. I put a little liquid on top, orange juice, but you could use cider, maybe some maple syrup, or just water.  Just a little liquid.
5. Put in 350 oven, covered for about 30 minutes and then uncover, check and return to oven until they are done to your liking.
6. Put the apples in bowls and spoon as much drippings as you like over the top.

These are delicious.  We had them with some leftover pork roast.