5 healthy, hearty cereals to try this winter

When it’s cold outside, there’s nothing like a hot breakfast to start your day. A bowl of oatmeal, while easy to make and packed with fiber, protein and vitamins, can get boring real quick if you don’t mix it up every now and then. Playing around with different toppings, adding varieties of nuts, fruits and seeds, will pack in even more nutrition and freshen up your bowl of oats with new flavors.

If you’re looking to experiment even more, remember oatmeal isn’t the only breakfast grain in the field. Polenta, quinoa, and bulgur can also add the proof to your porridge.

Here are four hot cereal recipes — and one for overnight oats, possibly the best breakfast hack out there — to make your winter mornings more nourishing — not to mention, hygge.

Golden Turmeric-Flax Breakfast Polenta with Sauteed Apples

Stephanie Clarke and Willow Jarosh of C&J Nutritionfavor coarse ground cornmeal, also known as polenta, for their winter mornings, “because of its smooth creamy texture and the fact that it’s a whole grain, [making it] rich in nutrients like fiber and B vitamins”.

They sprinkle theirs with flaxseed for omega-3’s, turmeric and cinnamon for antioxidants (also adds a nice tinge of color) and add sauteed apples for a bit of sweetness and extra fiber. Protein-rich crumbled walnuts help keep you satiated.

“This is a breakfast that packs in nutrition and won’t leave you feeling hungry an hour later,” the nutrition-duo says. Get the recipehere.

Jacked up morning oats

Make your morning bowl of oats go the extra mile by loading it up with good stuff.Instagrammer@veggininthecitymakes hers with cashew milk, and then tops with bananas, hemp seeds, frozen berries and cinnamon. She says, “I love this recipe because it’s warm and satisfying on cold days in New York and it is the perfect fuel for a busy day.”

Overnight oats

Okay, so these aren’t exactly hot, but they’re a set-it-and-forget-it breakfast you can throw together the night before and then just wake up and eat, making your mornings that much easier. You make them by adding milk or water to oats (your choice of steel-cut, rolled or instant), along with any other fixings you’d like, then cover and let sit in the refrigerator overnight.The Minimalist Bakerprepares hers in a mason jar, mixing (gluten-free) rolled oats with almond milk, peanut butter, chia seeds and maple syrup (or another sweetener) and then adds strawberries and bananas in the morning.

Slow cooker/crockpot oats

Essentially overnight oats that you can eat hot in the morning, the crockpot method is another breakfast oatmeal hack. You’ll want to use steel cut oats, also known as Irish oatmeal, and cook for seven to eight hours on low. (They’re coarser and take longer to cook, compared to fast-cooking, rolled oats, which are pre-steamed and then flattened and would end up mushy after heating for so many hours).Thisrecipefrom Instagrammer @constancelyeating adds in bulgur wheat, a mineral-rich plant-based grain, to bulk up the porridge even more. Vanilla, cinnamon and raisins sweeten it up; she tops with almonds, blueberries and chia seeds.

Breakfast quinoa bowl

Quinoa bowls: not just for sad desk lunches anymore. Food bloggerJeanine Donofrio of Love & Lemonspreparesa Cinnamon Quinoa Breakfast Bowl. Simmer two parts almond milk, one part quinoa on the stove with whole cinnamon sticks, then top with coconut flakes, peaches, raspberries and sliced almonds.