The one time I tried out a breakfast oats recipe (and failed).

And also my complaints about the recipe as presented by Brand's.

So, I don't normally fancy oats unless they're an accompaniment to a savoury dish or a dessert, and certainly not as a dish on its own! But this recipe card I found over the packaging of Brand's Essence of Chicken intrigued me.

The third recipe with oats, to be precise.

So, for those who are unfamiliar with it, Brand's Essence of Chicken is usually taken on its own, straight from the bottle. It can be added to dishes, though that kind of thing is not very common. I guess that's why they decided to include these recipes on the box to give a fresh new outlook to taking it.

Anyway, if you look at the third recipe, the Brand's Oats recipe seemed really simple and I figured I finally have a use for a packet of oats I've received from the supermarket as a sample. This was also a good opportunity to try something new for breakfast!

The aforementioned oats!

The oats' cooking instructions!

These oats appear to be used for a sweet breakfast dish, but I figured I can adapt it to a savoury dish by cooking the oats in a savoury stock.

Bovril, my preferred savoury stock.

The road to failure...

Since the Brand's Oats recipe was not very detailed, I decided to do my own take on it. The plan was to cook the oats in the Bovril stock (with a little bit of soy sauce), add the Brand's Essence Of Chicken, and then top it off with a half-boiled egg like in the recipe picture. Sounds simple, but what I didn't realise was that I messed up with the proportions.

Add the oats to the boiling stock...

Let it simmer...

And it's done?

So, what I did wrong was that I added too much water to the Bovril stock. I hardly ate oats on their own so I never imagined that they could be so... tasteless. I should have gone with my initial gut feeling and use just enough water to just dissolve the Bovril paste. Thinking back on it, I should have also tasted the oats throughout the cooking process so that I could have made adjustments. orz

Transfer to serving bowl...

Needless to say, the oats tasted really bland, but I figured adding stuff to it should improve the taste!

There's the egg...

And now the Brand's essence of chicken!

...By the gods, this is starting to look worse, lol.

Unfortunately the essence of chicken and the egg were not enough to offset the blandness of the oats! I had to add a bit of Vegemite and soy sauce to give it more flavour. Only then did I start to enjoy these oats a little.

Incoming rambling...

Looking back at it now, I realise that Brand's could have provided a little more detail to their Brand's Oats recipe. I have some complaints on how they presented that recipe, because I don't think oats are a common staple in South East Asian homes (unless my family is an oddity). When you compare the oats recipe to the other two Brand's breakfast boost recipes up there, "half-boiled eggs" and "porridge" already tells you how the eggs and rice are to be cooked. Maybe the microwave part is telling me how the oats are to be cooked, but I'm not sure if 30 seconds are enough to cook oats in the microwave, or if one bottle of essence of chicken is even enough to do the deed. When it said to prepare a bowl of oats, do they mean a bowl of cooked or uncooked oats?

At the bottom of those Brand's recipes, it said to visit their Facebook page for more recipes, but all I could find was a Youtube video showing those same recipes. No other recipes whatsoever on their Facebook page despite claiming so. And I also have something to say about that Youtube video!

Like before, I've no problem about the way the half-boiled eggs and porridge are presented, since they're already cooked before the essence of chicken is added to them. My problem again is with how the oats recipe is shown in the video. You see the Brands Essence Of Chicken being added to a bowl of dried oats, and then it skips to the end product with all the garnishing and toppings. There's no mention of the microwaving part. Looks like adding the Brand's Essence of Chicken to uncooked oats is the way to go! /s

By the looks of it, it's as though the Brand's Oats recipe was added as an afterthought, by people who have no idea on how to cook oats. Either that, or they somehow assume that their target market (i.e. all of Malaysia) already knows how to cook oats and didn't bother to elaborate.

Which led to this, lol

But on the bright side...

...I see some potential for this dish! I just have to fine-tune the way I cooked the oats, like making sure the stock is concentrated and seasoned enough! I could also add some pepper to give it some kick. I should also research some oat recipes so that I know what else I could add to the oats to make them taste good!

If there's one thing good to take away from this experience, it's that it has introduced me to another breakfast option! Let's hope it will go well the next time!