Bircher Muesli – Filling & Creamy!

2-3 servings 

A healthy and filling “cereal”. This modernized version of the original Swiss Bircher-Benner muesli recipe is still the prototype of most of the muesli cereal of today.

Dr. Bircher-Benner

He gained ideas and inspiration from observing the shepherd’s way of living in the Swiss Alps, where they carried on a simple and healthy life in the late 19th century. Dr. Bircher-Benner found that the patients at his clinic recovered faster and better when they ate a balanced diet of raw vegetables, fruits and nuts. (Smart doctor!).

Read about him and how he “invented the muesli”!

In this recipe, we use nut cream instead of dairy cream. Otherwise, it’s just the same muesli that was served over 120 years ago in the beautiful snow-covered alps.

If you use raw rolled oats, then see the recipe RAW MÜSLI below for instructions.
Recipe for Almond Cream can also be found further down.

The original recipe, like ours, says that there should be a lot more fruit than cereal, and as one of our young “test” people expressed when tasting Bircher Müsli: “Oh, it’s just grated apples, yummy!”.

Ingredients

½ cup rolled oats, gluten free or regular (raw see recipe below)
1 cup almond cream (see recipe below)
2 apples, preferably tart and juicy, grated
Freshly squeezed juice from ½ lime or lemon
1 handful chopped hazelnuts/filberts or other nuts
Optional: Do serve with other fruits like grapes or raspberries and maybe som homemade Date Syrup or raw honey.

Directions

1. Make the almond cream, see recipe below. Pour into a mixing bowl.
2. Add oat meal and stir to mix.
3. Seed the apples and grate in a food processor or use a hand grater.
4. Squeeze lime- or lemon juice over the apples. Prevents them from browning and gives a certain tang.
5. Place the apples in the bowl with oats and cream and stir until well mixed. Add more cream for a thinner muesli.
6. Chop the nuts and sprinkle over the muesli before serving.

TIP

This is actually pretty easy to prepare. The trick is to plan! (You have heard that one before 😉)
Here are a few good tips:

Almond Cream

Store soaked and drained nuts in a sealed glass jar in the fridge. They last for a week with an occasional rinse. Then you have nuts ready for making milk or cream.

Or make the almond cream the day before. Now it’s ready in the fridge to be used. Nut cream stored in a glass jar with lid keeps for 2-4 days in the refrigerator.
Here you’ll find the recipe for Almond Cream.

Lime-/citronsaft

Store fresh lime / lemon juice in a glass bottle in the fridge. It keeps for about 5 days.

Dark color

The color of the muesli is a bit dark and that is because I have not peeled the almonds, and the date syrup and the vanilla powder are both brown and give color.
But who cares? As long as the taste is yummy 😉!

Muesli Variations

Grapes

Add grapes when they are in season. They are juicy and pleasantly tangy.

 

Berries
A handful of fresh or frozen raspberries adds both flavor and color.

Do stir a couple of times before you serve.

RAW MÜSLI

If you are using traditional, old-fashioned oat flakes (not steam or heat-treated) then they should be soaked overnight in the almond cream and the grated apples with lemon juice. Just as they did a century ago.

Use the same measurements and preparations as for the Bircher Müsli recipe, besides the soaking.

Have YOU tried Bircher Müsli? And do you like it?