I have an affinity for breakfast. You have probably already realized this though from my recent posts of 3 various egg scrambles, breakfast cookies, chocolate muffin parfait and now this pumpkin crisp…even if you aren’t a breakfast eater (and I won’t judge), all of these recipes are equally as delicious served as snacks or treats or whip up a scramble for a light lunch or dinner.

Confession — I can easily fall into a rut of eating the same dishes over and over, BUT I’ve made a point to increase my variety of foods in my meals in the past year — and my body has thanked me for it. My skin and digestion have improved, I have more energy and simply put, I feel more healthy.

I am such a “routine girl” that I have to work at breaking my monotony. Example: when I look back when I was working in the sales office a year ago, my eats during a work week usually consisted of:

Breakfast: I basically ate a smoothie for breakfast every day (protein powder, non dairy milk, fruit and/or nut butter and/or oats)
Snack: the same snack of mixed nuts
Lunch: the same lunch of Nut Thins crackers, hummus, a string cheese or deli meat, carrots and cucumbers and an apple or orange
Afternoon Snack: either a banana or apple with peanut butter or nut butter or a Larabar if on the go
Dinner & Dessert: this was the ONLY free for all I had with some chance of variety*

Sounds pretty boring, right? Does anyone else struggle to mix up their eats?

I should have known better to include a greater mix of foods in my daily dishes…and now I can see and feel a difference in my eating patterns. Don’t get me wrong, the weekends were always different but I really needed some variety – after all, “variety is the spice of life” 🙂

So back to this breakfast crisp, in case you (like me) need a little inspiration on the breakfast front. Pumpkin, juicy blueberries, fiber-packed oats and flaxseed, crunchy nuts, heart-healthy hemp seeds and non-dairy milk make up this easy dessert-looking breakfast while packed with nutrition. The filling is lightly sweetened and spiced and smooth while the top is chewy and crispy – I gotta give it up for texture on this dish. Top it off with some cool yogurt and you’ve got the warm and cold contrasts going on too — comforting, nutrient-dense and of course delicious!

Pumpkin-Blueberry Breakfast Crisp for One

Filling Ingredients 
2/3 cup pumpkin or winter squash puree
1 tsp arrowroot flour (could sub tapioca flour or cornstarch)
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
pinch of sea salt
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
pinch of allspice
drizzle of maple syrup (about 1 tsp or to taste)
3 Tbsp fresh or frozen blueberries (about 15 berries)

Crisp Topping Ingredients
1/4 cup of gluten free rolled oats
1 Tbsp flaxseed meal (or chia seed meal)
1 Tbsp hemp seeds, optional
2 Tbsp chopped nuts or seeds (walnuts, pecans, almonds, sunflower are all good and add texture)
2 tsp maple syrup (or agave or honey) or stevia to taste
1 tsp coconut oil (or butter, ghee, earth balance), melted
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
pinch of sea salt

1/4 to 1/3 cup non dairy milk (coconut, hemp, almond, soy etc)

Greek yogurt or non-dairy plain yogurt for serving, optional
Drizzle of maple syrup for serving, optional

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350F.
2. In a small bowl, combine all of the filling ingredients and spread into an (greased or ungreased, doesn’t matter) individual gratin or casserole dish.
3. In another small bowl, add the topping ingredients except for the milk; it should be dry and crumbly, this is ok. Sprinkle and spread on top of the filling mixture.
4. Pour milk over the topping mixture. It should look like this.

5.  Bake for 30 minutes until top is lightly golden. Top with a dollop of dairy or non dairy Greek yogurt (if desired) and a sprinkle of cinnamon and/or a drizzle of maple syrup and serve warm!

*this is not a traditional crisp, the filling has the texture more of a pudding so if you want more body to the filling, decrease the amount of pumpkin and up the amount of berries. You might even be able to subbed out all of the pumpkin for diced apple, blueberries, strawberries, etc with a different flavor and texture but I haven’t tried this 🙂

Recipe Notes: to increase the protein in this dish, you could add a 1/2 scoop of protein powder to the pumpkin puree and decrease the arrowroot/cornstarch/tapioca to 1/2 tsp or possibly even eliminate it altogether.