Recipe: Flax-Coconut Chocolate Hot 'Cereal' for Keto

What do you eat for breakfast on keto? That’s a common question. Since you may need to get on keto before you can successfully do the No Breakfast Plan, or morning fasting, it helps to have something easy to fix on hand. And even on the No Breakfast Plan this is great to have later in the day. I sometimes have it for a light supper when I’ve had a bigger lunch. 

Note that this ‘cereal’, though it contains unsweetened shredded coconut, doesn’t really have a strong coconut taste. To me it just tastes like hot cereal. And chocolate! So even if you don’t care for coconut flavor you may love this.

I make multiple servings of this ‘cereal’ and store them in snack-sized plastic bags, which are then stored in a large plastic container designed to hold things like flour or cold cereal, which I no longer use. In the mornings I just heat up some water, as I would for tea or instant coffee, and measure out 1/3 cup into the bowl holding the ‘cereal’ serving. I wait 2 - 3 minutes for the hot water to work its magic, and then it’s done.

Ingredients:

1 1/2 Tablespoon ground walnuts (pecans, almonds)

1 1/2 Tablespoon UNSWEETENED shredded Coconut meat

1 Tablespoon ground flax seed meal 

1/8 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon Cocoa powder or Cacao powder

1/2 teaspoon stevia powder sweetener

Combined these dry ingredients. I use 4 1/2 pint sized canning jars to make up 4 servings, then transferring the mix to individual snack-sized plastic bags for storage. You could also store them in the canning jars if you wish to avoid plastic. 

To make a serving: empty bag or jar into bowl. Styrofoam bowls work for this. Add 1/3 cup HOT water, as you would make for tea. WAIT 2 - 3 minutes. Eat. 

This recipe was adapted from a recipe in Dana Carpender's Fat Fast Cookbook. I changed it and added the chocolate, and removed some stuff to make it easier to make ahead. 

To work out the carb count— figure out the amount of carbs and fiber in the amount of the different ingredients indicated. Add up the carbs and the fiber to get totals. To do NET carbs, subtract the fiber from the carbs. (Your ingredients may be different from mine, and you may have adjusted the amounts, so it’s good to know how to do this for yourself. There is even software/apps that will help.)

NOTES: Any type of ground nuts in dry form may be used. The UNSWEETENED coconut meat is not the same as the common sweetened coconut you find in the baking section of the grocery store! My local Gary’s Market in Stephenson MI does not carry UNSWEETENED shredded coconut at any time. This past Christ-Mass season I found bags of UNSWEETENED shredded coconut at Jack’s Market in Menominee, MI—  where my mother lives. It was in a center aisle filled with baking ingredients for making Christ-Mass cookies. I don’t know if they normally carry UNSWEETENED shredded coconut, but I have been able to get some year round at the WalMart in Marinette, Wisconsin (across a bridge from Menominee.)

As to the flax seed meal: I also can’t get that at my small rural grocery, Gary’s Market. I can get it in various brands at both Jack’s Market and WalMart. Flaxseed is very fiber-filled and healthy, but don’t double the amount or it will make the cereal weird and slimy. I have make this cereal with only half the flax seed meal. Also: whole flax seeds are nice, but they require a bit more cooking than they would get in this cereal mix. Go with the ground flax seed. Or grind your own flax seeds if you have the equipment. 

Sweetener: I recommend Truvia brand. Beware of uber-cheap powdered stevia from dollar stores, it may have maltodextrin in it! If you prefer liquid stevia, leave the sweetener out and remember to add the liquid stevia when making a helping. 4-6 drops of Sweetleaf should counteract the bitterness of the unsweetened chocolate. 

Unless you are in a tiny and remote town, you should be able to get your ingredients at local groceries— an important consideration for those on the Food Stamp program who can’t buy many food items online for cost reasons.

VARIATION: If you don’t care for chocolate hot cereal leave out the cocoa and sweetener and eat it plain. The plain cereal is a good idea if you are doing penance in Lent or on Fridays, as Catholics are encouraged to do. Or use varied flavor Sweetleaf to spice it up. Add cinnamon and use English Toffee flavored liquid stevia from Sweetleaf. I’ve done the cinnamon, but frankly I prefer chocolate, chocolate, chocolate. Maybe it’s a personal failing?

SENIOR CITIZENS and CAREGIVERS: This is an excellent and easy to prepare breakfast, which can also be eaten at other times of day. A caregiver can make up bags or jars of the cereal in advance if the person needing care would have difficulty doing the measuring-out for himself. A keto senior who begins to need some help with meal prep will find this is something easy to train your caregiver to prepare for you— it’s just a lot of measuring stuff. 

RECIPE FEEDBACK: If you try the recipe, do come back and tell me how it went in a comment. Or even if you are just THINKING of trying it and have a comment or question about that.