Easy Buckwheat Porridge

If you haven’t already noticed, breakfast is one of my favorite meals, and I’m always looking for ways to switch it up, or make it easier. If you’re looking to switch up your morning bowl of oats, then give buckwheat a try. It has a chewy texture and mild flavor, that pairs with just about anything.

This buckwheat porridge is so easy to make, and is naturally gluten-free, dairy-free, and vegan to boot, and the bonus is it takes under 15 minutes to whip up in the morning. This is the perfect breakfast to warm your insides on a cold fall or winter morning. 

This breakfast is hubby approved. Steve tried this the other day and kept saying, “this is the best breakfast,” “man, this is SO good.” So if I can get my mountain biking, carb loving hubby to happily eat of bowl of this, then I think your family might love this too.

I still love and make my overnight buckwheat groat porridge all the time, but it takes a bit more planning ahead.

All you have to do for this version is soak the groats overnight before you go to bed. It literally takes 2 minutes to prep the groats to soak, all you need is 1 cup buckwheat groats, enough water to cover and a container with a lid. Done!

What the heck is buckwheat?

Buckwheat – Despite its name, buckwheat does not contain and has no relation to wheat! Buckwheat is not technically a grain, but the seed of a plant related to rhubarb. It’s a gluten-free, blood-building food that helps clean and strengthen the intestines and lower blood pressure. It has a mild flavor and chewy texture. Its protein is superior to that of most cereal grains, providing all amino acids, including the essential ones. It’s nature’s best source of the important nutrient rutin, an efficacious vitamin C complex flavonoid.

I’m using raw buckwheat groats, not kasha, which is toasted buckwheat, as I want to make sure my groats are soaked to activate the nutrients, and make them more digestible. Store-bought kasha may not have been soaked prior to being toasted, plus it has a strange bitter flavor to me, that I find off putting. I much prefer the mildness of buckwheat groats.

Easy Buckwheat Porridge

Note, you will have to soak the buckwheat groats the night before you make the porridge, see my note on why in the below recipe.

serves 4

• 1 cup frozen wild, or regular blueberries – the amount of blueberries you use is really dependent on how many people are eating the porridge right away. I usually grab a large handful if it’s just me eating the porridge that morning. 
• 1 cup unsweetened canned coconut milk – I love Native Forest Simple, as it has no guar or gums and comes in BPA free cans – make sure to shake the can, and get the one where you can hear the milk swishing around, as it will be easier to work with. If you don’t want to use coconut milk, then increase the almond milk to 3 cups.
• 2 cups almond milk, or alternative milk of choice – for store bought, I love Three Trees almond milk, as it’s as close to homemade as you can get. Ingredients are; filtered water, organic almonds, organic vanilla, plus they are a small female based SF company.
• 1/4 teaspoon Pink Himalayan sea salt or Celtic sea salt
• 1 cup raw organic buckwheat groats, not kasha – pre-soaked, rinsed – *please see note below on how to soak groats.  You can find buckwheat groats in most bulk bins at your grocery store.
• 1 tablespoon pure maple syrup, if you’re on a candida cleanse, then skip this ingredient, you can naturally sweeten the porridge with a tablespoon of coconut butter, coconut cream, or you can add a bit of Stevia to taste to each individual bowl. 
• 1 tablespoon raw plain Tahini – I love this Tahini from Soco 
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon – I typically use Ceylon cinnamon

Why soak the groats? Soaking groats makes them more digestible, and helps to remove phytic acid, which would otherwise interfere with mineral absorption, and neutralize enzyme inhibitors. Soaking also allows the enzymes, lactobacilli (friendly folk bacteria) and other helpful organisms to break down some of the harder-to-digest starches. Overall, it’s a really good idea, even if you are in excellent health with stellar digestion.  

In the morning: