I freaking love sweet potatoes, so it was only natural for me to eventually make a Sweet Potato Casserole Baked Oatmeal. :) Sweet potatoes are fairly inexpensive because they’re very shelf stable, they’re packed with nutrients, and you can use them in both sweet and savory dishes—what’s not to love? That’s why they’re one of my absolute favorite ingredients. I modeled this baked oatmeal after the classic Thanksgiving classic side dish, sweet potato casserole, but I used less sugar and tried to make it as breakfast-worthy as possible. Luckily sweet potatoes have quite a bit of natural sweetness, so I was able to go light on the added sugar.
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This is a Marshmallow Free Zone
To make this baked oatmeal even more like the sweet potato casserole we all know and love I topped it with a pecan crumble (sorry, I’m not a fan of marshmallows). I went light on the topping because again, I want it to count as a breakfast rather than a dessert, but even the small amount I added made a big impact on the dish. The pecans toast while the oatmeal bakes and add a wonderfully deep and earthy flavor that balances beautifully with the sweetness of the casserole. It’s just perfect! 👌
Meal Prep Your Sweet Potato Casserole Baked Oatmeal
This baked oatmeal, like all my baked oatmeal recipes, is perfect for breakfast meal prep! Refrigerate the cooked portions of the baked oatmeal for 4-5 days, or freeze for up to a few months. You can serve your leftover portions cold, or reheated in the microwave. I also like to pour a little milk on top!
More Baked Oatmeal Please!
And I know I say this every time I make a new baked oatmeal flavor, but I really do think this is my new favorite! You’ll just have to make it and judge for yourself. ;) Want to try some other flavors? Try Oatmeal Cookie Baked Oatmeal, Peanut Butter Brownie Baked Oatmeal, Baked Pumpkin Pie Oatmeal, or Blueberry Banana Baked Oatmeal.
Sweet Potato Casserole Baked Oatmeal
Servings 6Ingredients
- 2 cups mashed sweet potato* ($1.33)
- 2 large eggs ( $0.54)
- 1/4 cup brown sugar ($0.08)
- 1 tsp vanilla extract ($0.84)
- 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg ($0.05)
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon ($0.05)
- 3/4 tsp salt ($0.04)
- 1 tsp baking powder $0.06 ($0.06)
- 2 cups milk ($0.75)
- 3 cups old-fashioned rolled oats ($0.51)
PECAN CRUMBLE TOPPING (optional)
- 1/4 cup all-purpose flour ($0.04)
- 2 Tbsp brown sugar ($0.04)
- 2 Tbsp salted butter ($0.20)
- 1/4 cup chopped pecans ($0.56)
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon ($0.05)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 375ºF. Prepare the crumble topping by mixing together the flour, brown sugar, butter, chopped pecans, and cinnamon. Mix the ingredients together until it looks like a crumbly mixture. Refrigerate the topping until ready to use.
- Add the mashed sweet potato to a large bowl along with the eggs, brown sugar, vanilla, nutmeg, cinnamon, salt, and baking powder. Stir until everything is evenly combined and mostly smooth. It’s okay if there are a few lumps of sweet potato.
- Pour the milk into the bowl with the sweet potato mixture and stir or whisk to combine. Add the rolled oats and stir to combine again.
- Coat the inside of a 2 quart baking dish lightly with non-stick spray. Pour the oatmeal mixture into the dish. Sprinkle the prepared pecan crumble topping over the oatmeal mixture.
- Bake the oatmeal in the fully preheated oven for 45 minutes or until the pecan crumble topping and edges of the oatmeal are slightly browned. Serve immediately or refrigerate for later. Can be eaten hot or cold.
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Notes
Nutrition
Have you tried this recipe?Mention @budgetbytes or tag #budgetbytes on Instagram!It’s like dessert for breakfast!
How to Make Sweet Potato baked oatmeal – Step by Step Photos
If your sweet potato isn’t already cooked and mashed, do that first. You’ll need about 2 cups once mashed. I used a sweet potato that was just slightly over 1 lb. and it yielded just over 2 cups once mashed. If you have slightly more or less than 2 cups, the recipe will still work fine. You can use whatever method to cook the sweet potatoes that you like, but I find boiling to be the fastest and easiest route. To boil them, first peel, then dice the sweet potatoes.
Add the diced sweet potatoes to a sauce pot and cover with water. Boil over high heat until they are very tender (5-7 minutes). Drain the sweet potatoes, then mash. Let the sweet potatoes cool slightly.
While the sweet potatoes cool, prepare the pecan crumble topping. In a bowl, combine 1/4 cup all-purpose flour, 2 Tbsp brown sugar, 2 Tbsp salted butter, 1/4 cup chopped pecans, and 1/2 tsp cinnamon.
Mix these ingredients until they form a damp crumbly mixture (I used my hands to mix them together). Refrigerate the pecan crumble topping until ready to use.
Preheat the oven to 375ºF. In a large bowl combine 2 cups of the mashed sweet potato with 2 large eggs, 1/4 cup brown sugar, 1 tsp vanilla, 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg, 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 3/4 tsp salt, and 1 tsp baking powder. Stir them together until they are fairly smooth (a few sweet potato lumps are okay).
Stir or whisk in 2 cups of milk.
Finally, stir in 3 cups dry old-fashioned rolled oats until everything is evenly combined.
Lightly coat the inside of a 2 quart baking dish with non-stick spray (this is an 8×13 inch casserole dish). Pour the oat mixture into the dish.
Sprinkle the pecan crumble topping over the oats. They won’t fully cover the top. It will be more like a 50-60% coverage.
Bake the casserole for 45 minutes, or until the pecan crumble topping and the edges of the baked oatmeal are lightly browned. Serve immediately, or refrigerate it for later. You can eat this Sweet Potato Casserole Baked Oatmeal either hot or cold.
I love it warmed up with a little cold milk poured over top! You can also freeze portions for later, but be sure to fully cool it in the refrigerator before transferring it to the freezer. Frozen portions reheat very easily in the microwave. Now I have breakfast all set for the rest of the week! :D
We made this for brunch this morning and used homemade candied pecans in the topping! A M A Z I N G. We love your recipes!!
The recipe doesn’t specify, but I used melted butter for the streusel topping since I didn’t have room temp. (based on the Orange Cranberry Muffins recipe method). I used almond milk and it worked out to 380 calories for 1/6 serving. This is probably my favorite out of the baked oatmeal recipes.
I love this recipe and make it year round! So much so that I’m turning on my oven today when it’s 80 degrees out so I can enjoy it this week 😂
I didn’t have any sweet potato so I used canned pumpkin, added a little cloves and a little more pecan and it’s the best one yet to me.
Oh that’s a great swap Roxie!
How many cans of pumpkin did you use?
This is the perfect amount of sweetness for breakfast! The first time I made it, it turned out a little dry for my taste, but I cut back the bake time to 30 min and that’s more my style. To cut back Sabbath morning prep, I cook and mash the potatoes the day before. YUM! Baked oatmeal might become a new obsession.
I made this but somehow just totally spaced the topping and it was still really good! My picky toddler ate a full serving when he normally refuses oatmeal.
Just made this! Love it!
I used my pressure cooker to make the mashed sweet potatoes which took about 6 minutes with 2 large sweet potatoes cut into inch squares and a half cup of water. I put the cinnamon and “nutmeg” in the PC to infuse flavor (I used apple seasoning instead of nutmeg because I was out, oops)
Their was about 1 1/2 cups of sweet potatoes left over which my 2 year old is currently eating some as a mid day snack 😁
Do you think this recipe would work with steel cut oats in place of rolled oats? Also wondering how it would be with Scottish oatmeal, which is basically very finely ground steel cut oats. Finally, can I substitute stevia (or some other lower calorie natural sweetener) for all or some of the brown sugar? When I make my regular bowl of oatmeal, I cook it with at least half of a sliced banana. The banana gets very soft and mushy, so it easily mixes in with the oatmeal. The sweetness from the banana is so delicious that I don’t need to any sugar, syrup, honey or any sweetener at all. Would adding bananas to this recipe be a good substitute for the brown sugar? Thanks for sharing your thoughts about these questions.
Unfortunately you won’t be able to simply substitute the steel cut oats for the rolled oats in this recipe because steel cut require much more moisture and a longer cooking time to soften. I’m sure there’s a way to do it, but it would take some testing to figure out the correct amount of liquid and the correct cooking time. I often use mashed bananas in my baked oatmeals, so I know they go well, but whether they would be a good sub for the brown sugar all together would just depend on your personal tastes. :)
This recipe is wonderful! I have to admit that I had run out of vanilla and substituted 1/4 t maple flavoring, yum! The kids and hubby liked it, too.
I love this recipe! It’s a family favorite. Has anyone frozen beforehand baking? I have leftover sweet potatoes and would like to throw a couple pans together to freeze.
Hey! Just stumbled upon this recipe- eager the try it! Any comments/suggestions to use almond or a non-dairy milk? I was thinking that it’d be worth a try :) thanks!!!!
I think a few people have mentioned that they’ve used non-dairy milk and it’s worked fine. :)
I made this as-written and it was super awesome. Really good flavor. I drizzled maple syrup on mine in the morning for breakfast for a little sweetness since the recipe itself is not very sweet (which is great). I have also made some of these with 3 or 4 eggs instead of 2 for a bit of extra protein and had really good results. Beth have you ever considered maybe coming up with a high protein breakfast bake? I bet a lot of people would enjoy that as an option!
I concur. I find the Peanut Butter Brownie Baked Oatmeal the most filling of the options because it also has the most protein. Might try doubling up on the eggs as well…
Love this recipe!! I have been leaving off the topping and using 1 Tbsp maple syrup instead of brown sugar and adding about 1/2 cup dried cranberries to the mix. Absolutely delicious. My husband and twins love it too! Thanks Beth!
Do you have a recommendation for something to replace the pecan topping? I’m not a huge fan of pecans but this recipe still seems delicious!
You can use walnuts instead or add some dry oats to make it like an apple crisp topping.
Oh, dry oats, I should’ve thought of that! I can’t eat tree nuts, so I just left the pecans out and used the other ingredients and it wasn’t bad as it was.
can I use instant oats to make this instead of rolled oats
You can, but you’ll get a much more mushy texture.
Hi Beth,
Major fan over here!! Would it be possible for you to tell us the dimensions of the pan you used? For example, 8X8 vs 9X13? It would really help me out :)
Thank you for the wonderful recipes! My husband and I are generally able to make in on $50/week for groceries, assisted in no small part by you!
Delish! Sweet enough for me yet not too sweet to pass off as breakfast. The topping was just the right amount.
HOw do you eat this. I mean with milk, cut in bars and eat, or some other way. Just curious.
thank you,
shirley
I break it up into a bowl and either warm it up in the microwave or just eat it cold. Sometimes I also pour cold milk over it. It has a texture similar to bread pudding, soft but semi-solid.
I have been making this on a weekly basis. My husband and I can’t get enough and it helps with my sweet potato cravings. Going to try the chocolate banana one next for my husband (chocoholic).
Can you replace brown sugar with maple syrup? If so, how much?
You probably could, although I haven’t tried it so I’m not sure what the appropriate ratio would be.
Yum! So perfect for a brunch – it avoids so many of the things folks these days are trying to avoid. It is delicious and very easy to make for this novice cook!
Beth, I have no idea how long I’ve been following budgetbytes other than it was on the old blog. You finally enticed me to try baked oatmeal and all it took was sweet potatoes. I just ate 2 squares for supper and loved it. I’m already contemplating how to customize it next time – more cinnamon, more pecans, maybe coconut. I also wonder about letting the mixture sit for a little while to allow the oats to soften more before baking – how that would affect the end texture. Have you tried that with any baked oatmeal and did it make any difference? Also have you experimented yet with leaving the potatoes chunky? Thanks. I appreciate you.
I haven’t tried that, but I suspect it would definitely give the oats a little less of a “rough” texture. If you give it a shot, let me know! I like the rough texture, but I know not everyone does. :)
Has anyone tried this? Often with breakfast casseroles, we prep it and have it in the pan ready to go in the fridge overnight, so we can just bake in the morning, so that it doesn’t take as long to make. We are considering how that’d work with this, but are conflicted. I’m pretty sure by morning we’d just have a giant pan of overnight oats. Mom claims that that would just decrease the baking time, since the oats are already cooked (basically just needing to heat and toast the topping, I guess). Anyone have any ideas?
This looks like heaven! I cannot WAIT to try it. Thank you for sharing :)
Yum. I don’t have sweet potatoes this week, but I do have frozen pumpkin puree from fresh pumpkins. Gonna do that instead and sub some of the spices for a pumpkin spice blend. Hoping it turns out!
Has anyone tried making this with canned sweet potatoes? I’m lazy :)
That should still work! :) Just drain off any excess liquid.
The canned sweet potatoes which I have seen are packed with sugar or syrup. Check the label and consider whether or not you’ll want to add extra sugar. I don’t know whether you could rinse the canned potatoes before using.
I have an egg allergy. Do you have substitution suggestions? I often use the combination of ground flax and a. It of water. Hoping to try this as a thanksgiving side dish. Thanks!
I’ve heard a few other people say that they use the flax substitute and it works well, but I’ve never tried it.
YMMV, but my attempt turned out really, really dry – I used 3 cups old fashioned oats but felt like it only needed 2, or maybe more liquid. Looked just like the picture though :) And generally I LOVE the recipes on your site!
Oh. My. Gosh. The Sweet Potato Casserole Baked Oatmeal is absolutely delicious!!! I baked the sweet potatoes the night before at 375 for one hour. Before I mashed the sweet potatoes, I added some butter. Although the recipe calls for 1/4 cup of brown sugar, I added 1/4 cup of regular sugar for added sweetness. I LOVE the pecan crumb topping, and will have to double the recipe next time. I served oatmeal casserole with some breakfast sausage links. My apartment smelled heavenly when I was getting ready for work. I’m looking forward to having the oatmeal for breakfast all this week. Thank you, Beth!! :-)
I may have more-than-doubled the pecan crumble. :D
Loved this recipe. Didn’t use most of the topping ingredients so I could save on calories. Toasted the nuts and put them into the oatmeal mix. Maybe my oven runs hot; 45 minutes was too long. Over all, great recipe. I eat baked oatmeal for dessert.
This is amazing! I keep taking bites as it’s cooling down, I’m not sure if it will last until breakfast in the morning. My place smells heavenly, too! I used vanilla soy milk instead of regular milk and extract, and completely forgot the baking powder but it still came out delicious. Thanks for all your great ideas!
Finally! A way to get me to eat oatmeal! And not in a cookie format! Made it for my breaky this week, and it is wonderful…thanks!
Love your recipes but hate your site. I can’t print the printer friendly recipe. I don’t know if it is because of Safari but I don’t like having 3-4 pages or more of your advertising nonsense with a thin column of the recipe.
What happens when you click on the print button? Does it just not open a separate browser tab with the printer friendly version?
There is this wonderful thing called Ad Block. use it.
Does anyone know if I were to add marshmallows, do they bake the same amount of time as the rest of the recipe? Should I change anything?
Oh, talk about good timing! I had just bought sweet potatoes last week (one of my faves for all the same reasons!) with the intent of making a baked oatmeal to eat on all week so I can get a healthier quick breakfast in before my early morning classes. I have pecans to add, and I also got some dates to chop up and mix in for a little extra oomph! Now I have a recipe to go with so I don’t have to wing it (although winging it usually works, too!)
Can’t wait to make this over the weekend. Hopefully it lasts me through Thursday!
I wonder if this would work with buttercup squash? I have some leftover that I roasted a couple days ago.
The flavor will probably be a little more squash-y, but it would technically work! :)
I’ve been alternating my dinners between baked oatmeal and “camote con leche” which is basically sweet potatoes with milk and dates. It’s like you read my mind and combined both! I’m excited to try this.
This looks so yummy! We love sweet potatoes and baked oatmeal, so I am exited to try this recipe. Two questions: Can I substitute walnuts for pecans (cheaper) and almond milk for dairy milk?
Beth may have her own suggestions, but I bet almond milk would be fine. I’ve tried canned coconut milk in some of the baked oatmeals – thickened the texture slightly, maybe, but I didn’t mind (and the finished product tasted better than ever!)
I made this yesterday using almond milk and walnuts and it turned out great!
I really want to try this but my husband hates pecans :( He is not a fan of any other nuts, with the exception of peanuts.
Any suggestions for an alternate crumble topping? :D
You could just simply leave out the pecans. It will still be good.
You can either leave them out, or try walnuts. :)
I don’t know if these comments get checked regularly as I see most are fairly old but if anyone’s reading this, I would sure love some suggestions. Ok so….I had a hankering for sweet potato casserole tonight (apparently I didn’t get enough on Thanksgiving this past week) so I clicked on the first recipe I saw that included oats cuz that’s the topping I usually have on it and I guess I wasn’t paying close enough attention (had my baby on my hip and waiting on hold with my bank) while trying to prepare the “casserole” and when it was finally done I took it out and thought “well this doesn’t look right”. It was then that I pulled up the recipe again and actually read the title and realized I’d made oatmeal! So it’s not terrible or anything, it’s just not what I had my heart set on. So I have this great big pan of oatmeal that I don’t wanna waste but can’t see myself eating on a daily for the next week or so. So I’m wondering if it’s salvageable somehow. The flavors are all there, it’s just the consistency of oatmeal that’s throwing it off (for what I had in mind anyway). I’m thinking I can use another can of canned yams that I already have and use the oatmeal as my topping, which will just also be full of yams…no biggie though. So I’m wondering what all I’ll need to add to the yams before baking. Brown sugar? Vanilla? Eggs? The whole 9 yards? Or do I just mash the yams and cover them with the oatmeal, then bake? And for how long? Any ideas would be appreciated!
Hmmm, unfortunately I don’t think I can offer any advice on this. I’ve never tried anything like that and it’s just too hard to guess at how it would turn out. I suppose the best thing to do is to look for an actual recipe for sweet potato casserole and see what they add to the sweet potatoes, then try that.
I almost got drool on my phone when I saw this. Thank you so much for this Beth! I’m gonna make it this weekend for football watching and food eating purposes.
Have you ever tried this (or a similar baked oatmeal recipe) with steel cut oats? I imagine it would require increased liquid and baking time…maybe covering it with foil for a spell too… Any other thoughts or suggestions? I love the texture of steel cut oatmeal and don’t want to go back to rolled :-) Thanks!
I wonder this too. I love steel cut oats and only keep rolled in the house for baking cookies! Jen you might also like the thick cut rolled oats from Bob’s Red Mill (pretty sure I picked them up at Sprouts – didn’t have to order them). But I would like to hear how people feel this recipe should be altered for steel cut oats please!
Yes we eat Bob’s all the time! We cook them in the rice cooker on the porridge setting – set up the night before and ready when we get up! We go through so many that we have them on subscription with Amazon.
I love making extra sweet potatoes whenever we have them for dinner and using them wherever pumpkin is called for-bread, coffee cake, cookies. I’ve already swapped the pumpkin out for sweet potatoes in the pumpkin pie baked oatmeal. I’m looking forward to trying out the topping on this one though…yum!
Woohoo, another baked oatmeal recipe! I made the pumpkin pie one (plus some dried cranberries) for a work potluck and it was a hit so I think I’ll just make baked oatmeals for all future pot luck events. Plus I lived on these when I was home on maternity leave – oats are good for breast milk production and it was an easy way to have the powder supplements I needed (for some reason portioning out cookies annoys me so this was an awesome alternative to lactation cookies). Thank you Beth!
Sweet potatoes are one of my favorites too but I never would have thought to make oatmeal with them! I adore your baked oatmeals, can’t wait to make this one as soon as I pick up some pecans.
I’ve had many many breakfasts made from a bowl of oatmeal with a scoop of baked sweet potato, a sprinkling of pecans, brown sugar, and cinnamon/ginger/nutmeg! SO good! Can’t wait to make the baked variety so I can just pop it in the microwave in the mornings!
It seems like such an obvious idea, but I’ve never thought to do sweet potato oatmeal. It always gets passed over for pumpkin this time of year =)