MUSH Overnight Oats

The concept of overnight oats turns off a lot of people.  Simple concept: take oats, add milk of your choice (sometimes yogurt), soak overnight, eat chilled from the fridge.  "Mushy old oatmeal?", I remember my mom saying when I tried to explain them to her.  "Who wants cold congealed oatmeal?", etc.  But for those familiar with bircher style muesli, the concept makes more sense, although they see overnight oats as super basic and lacking ... just milk base?  What about the citrus you should soak it with?

While I embraced overnight oats during a healthy phase I went through 15 or so years ago, I didn't really expect the general American public to, but, they did.  Just like instant oatmeal, you can buy overnight oats packets that you just add milk to and mix up the night before and place in your fridge.  No measuring required, and they often come with flavorings and mix-ins.  And now, ready-made refrigerated overnight oats exist in the cooler section at supermarkets, side by side with the plethora of yogurts.  Several leading brands have emerged, but MUSH seems to be pretty dominant.

Packaging.

"Ready-to-eat oats are different than traditional oatmeal in that they are never cooked. At MUSH, we soak old fashioned oats in almond, coconut, or oat milk. The resulting product is just as easy to digest as traditional oatmeal but is more nutrient dense. We haven't cooked off the vitamins and minerals. No need to heat, just eat!"

Mush makes a variety of flavors, and one thing I found frustrating is that you can't tell from the variety name which type of milk base it uses without reading the ingredients panel.  All use alternative milks, and all are gluten-free.  Flavors range from the basic vanilla bean or maple cinnamon, to fruity strawberry/blueberry/apple cinnamon, to decadent dark chocolate, peanut butter, peanut butter chocolate, or pb&j (yes, they went all in on the peanut butter varieties!).  Some use coconut milk, others almond milk, and others oat.  All use fairly minimal ingredients.

They suggest eating them chilled, but do mention that you can heat them if you wish, transferring to different packaging of course.

Dark Chocolate.

"It only tastes indulgent. MUSH Dark Chocolate Overnight Oats is a blissful blend of real cocoa powder, dates, nutrient-rich oats and silky smooth almond milk for a treat that’s hard to resist but easy to feel good about. Breakfast, dessert, or a 2pm snack…clean ingredients and 7g of protein make it the anytime treat that still keeps you firing on all cylinders."

I really wanted to love these.  But ... I didn't.  The texture of the oats is fine, soft, overnight oats after all.  Although they look creamy, the almond milk really isn't that creamy, I wanted more richness.  The almond milk flavor is fine, but more dominant is the dates.  Chocolate is there, but dominated by the dates too.

So ... reasonable texture oats, not creamy enough, ok flavors, but too much date and not enough chocolate.  I added fresh berries, cocoa nibs, and eventually whipped cream, but I wouldn't get these again.  **.