An Oatmeal Pancake with Melted Cheese and Jam. Yes, Both.

My new favourite breakfast involves oats, one egg, a little milk, melted cheese and something sweet on top. It sounds suspicious. It tastes excellent.

I have a weakness for breakfast food.

Eggs, pancakes, porridge, omelettes. All the usual things that civilised people eat in the morning, preferably accompanied by good coffee and without anyone demanding that I immediately become productive.

Oatmeal is a particular favourite.

I've already written about my adventures with Marmite in oatmeal, which probably tells you everything you need to know about my attitude toward conventional breakfast recipes.

Recently, I came across another idea online.

An oatmeal pancake made with an egg and a little milk.

Nothing revolutionary. People have probably been making variations of this for decades.

But after experimenting with it a little, I've arrived at something I now make regularly.

And, naturally, I've managed to make it slightly strange.

The secret is cheese.

And jam.

Together.

Don't leave yet.

The simplest oatmeal pancake imaginable

The basic recipe requires almost nothing.

Ingredients for one generous breakfast:

• 3 tablespoons of rolled oats, or one good handful if you prefer my highly scientific measuring system.
• 1 egg.
• 30–50 ml of milk.
• A small pinch of salt.
• A little butter for frying.

That's it.

No flour.

No baking powder.

No sugar.

No complicated ingredient that requires visiting a specialised organic supermarket on the other side of town.

Put the oats into a bowl.

Crack in the egg.

Add the milk.

Add a small pinch of salt.

Mix everything thoroughly.

I usually beat the mixture quite energetically with a fork.

Then I let it rest for a few minutes.

This is particularly useful if you're using larger rolled oats. They absorb some of the liquid, soften and become easier to cook into a reasonably coherent pancake.

I generally let the mixture rest even when the oats are relatively fine.

There's no hurry.

It's breakfast.

The frying pan incident

Heat a frying pan over medium heat and add a little butter.

I prefer butter because, well, butter.

Pour in the oatmeal mixture and spread it into a relatively even, round pancake.

Let it cook until the underside becomes golden and the top has set enough to hold together.

Then flip it.

You can use a spatula, obviously.

But this particular recipe has given me something more valuable than breakfast.

It finally taught me how to flip pancakes by throwing them into the air.

I'm not particularly proud of how long it took me to master this rather elementary kitchen manoeuvre.

But oatmeal pancakes are surprisingly cooperative.

The egg binds everything together, and once the first side has cooked properly, the pancake becomes structurally reliable enough to survive a brief period of uncontrolled flight.

A sharp forward-and-upward movement of the pan.

The pancake flies.

Turns over.

And, ideally, lands back in the pan rather than somewhere behind the refrigerator.

Very satisfying.

Completely unnecessary.

Highly recommended.

Now ruin it with cheese

At this point, you already have a perfectly acceptable oatmeal pancake.

You could put it on a plate and eat it.

You could add honey, yoghurt, fruit or whatever else respectable breakfast enthusiasts normally use.

But I prefer taking it one step further.

Once I've flipped the pancake, I put cheese on the cooked side, which is now facing upward.

Usually one of two options:

Mature cheddar, grated.

Or raclette cheese, cut into slices.

Living in France has certain advantages, and convenient access to excellent melting cheese is definitely one of them.

Cheddar gives the pancake a sharper, more pronounced flavour.

Raclette is softer, creamier and melts beautifully.

Both work.

Add enough cheese to make a difference, but not so much that your pancake becomes a dairy containment emergency.

Then fold the pancake in half.

Now you have something resembling a thick oatmeal omelette, with cheese trapped inside.

I usually turn it once more and let it cook briefly until the cheese has melted.

The outside becomes lightly browned.

The inside stays soft.

The cheese becomes wonderfully gooey.

And now we arrive at the part that may upset some people.

Add jam

Yes.

Jam.

On top of the cheese-filled oatmeal pancake.

Trust me on this.

My usual choices are strawberry jam, cherry preserves or confiture de fruits rouges, which is what happens when you live in France long enough to start referring to mixed berries in French.

Cherry is particularly good with mature cheddar.

Strawberry works beautifully too.

And mixed red fruits give the whole thing a slightly sharper, more acidic contrast.

You can also use honey.

The combination is surprisingly balanced.

The oatmeal provides a neutral, slightly nutty base.

The egg gives structure and richness.

The melted cheese contributes fat, salt and savoury depth.

The jam adds sweetness and acidity.

Nothing particularly mysterious is happening.

Sweet and salty flavours have been working together successfully for centuries.

We just tend to forget that when the subject is breakfast.

The result is somewhere between an oatmeal pancake, a cheese omelette and a very strange crêpe.

Which, in my kitchen, is an entirely respectable category of food.

Other experiments

Of course, you don't have to add cheese or jam.

Sometimes I make the basic version with no filling at all.

It's still good.

I've also experimented with adding a scoop of protein powder to the mixture. That works reasonably well, although you may need a little more milk to maintain the right consistency.

Another time, I tried using bottled egg whites instead of a whole egg.

Technically, it worked.

But I wasn't particularly impressed.

The texture wasn't quite the same, and the flavour was less interesting.

I much prefer using a whole egg.

Sometimes the traditional version of an ingredient exists for a reason.

Not every breakfast needs to be optimised into a nutritional engineering project.

A very good reason to get out of bed

What I like about this recipe is that it takes very little effort.

You need one bowl.

One frying pan.

A handful of ingredients.

And roughly ten minutes, perhaps a little longer if you let the oats rest.

There's no need to prepare anything the night before.

No special equipment.

No complicated technique, unless you insist on performing airborne pancake manoeuvres.

It also leaves plenty of room for experimentation.

Different cheeses.

Different jams.

Savoury fillings.

Fruit.

Honey.

Whatever happens to be in the refrigerator.

And because the basic mixture is so simple, it's difficult to make a truly catastrophic decision.

Although I'm sure I'll eventually find a way.

For now, my preferred version remains:

Oatmeal, one egg, a little milk, butter, mature cheddar or raclette, folded in half and finished with cherry or strawberry jam.

Serve it with good black tea or strong coffee.

Preferably while still warm, with the cheese properly melted.

That's an excellent breakfast.

Even if it sounds like something invented by a person who should not be allowed near a kitchen.