Rolled oats soaked in milk or yoghurt overnight, mixed with grated apple, lemon juice, hazelnuts and honey. Switzerland's quietly canonical breakfast.

Birchermuesli was developed by Maximilian Bircher-Benner, the Zurich physician who ran a Zurichberg sanatorium called Lebendige Kraft from 1904. He developed the recipe through nutritional experiments between roughly 1895 and 1900 and prescribed it as a raw, vitamin-rich morning meal to patients, modelled on a shepherd's breakfast he saw in the Swiss Alps. The original recipe used grated apple as the primary ingredient and oats only as a supplement, the modern proportions are roughly inverted. Haus Hiltl, opened 1898 down the hill, has served it ever since and is closest to the founding recipe.

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Make it at home

Serves 212 hrEasy

Ingredients

  • 100g rolled oats
  • 200ml whole milk or natural yoghurt
  • 1 large apple, unpeeled
  • 1 tablespoon lemon juice
  • 2 tablespoons hazelnuts, roughly chopped
  • 1 tablespoon honey
  • Pinch of salt

Method

  1. The night before, combine oats and milk or yoghurt in a bowl, cover and refrigerate overnight.
  2. In the morning, grate the apple coarsely on a box grater (skin and all, core only discarded).
  3. Toss the apple with lemon juice to keep it from browning.
  4. Stir the apple, hazelnuts, honey and a pinch of salt through the soaked oats.
  5. Serve immediately while the apple is still crisp.

Editor tip. Use a tart apple (Granny Smith or Boskoop), not a soft eating apple, the texture matters.

Common allergens: Gluten, Milk, Nuts.