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I said "enough!" after another breakfast caught me with a bowl of dry flavorless oats under my nose. Amid the morning rush, the oats didn't even have time to soak in the cold milk I had poured over them. So, I did what I should have done long ago: I started making my oats in the evening. Goodbye dry and tasteless texture, welcome soft, handy and flavorful overnight oats.
As you can learn from my experience, overnight oats are perfect for busy people who need a high-calorie breakfast but lack the time to prepare it.
But, although oats count among the foods with the most calories, overnight oats are a double-edged sword because they're so customizable. After all, you don't want to end up with a low-calorie serving best suited for weight loss that's also far from delicious.
To build muscle and meet increased energy needs, you should follow a recipe that yields a serving of overnight oats with optimum carbs and proteins. On top, you want that recipe to be tasty.
To help you out, we put together a list of ingredients and recipes you can use to make high-calorie overnight oats.
As a certified personal trainer and nutritionist, I tailored each recipe so they build muscle and respect science-backed dietary guidelines. Besides, by now I have used oats to create many other kinds of high-calorie recipes, like our protein granola, granola bars, and different oat shakes and smoothies, like the High-Calorie Oat Smoothie.
But enough talk.
Let's explore the recipes!
These Banana Walnut Overnight Oats inspired by the official Dietary Guidelines for Americans can help you build muscle with their many proteins and complex carbohydrates. With a creamy mouthfeel, their flavor is dominated by bananas but settled down by the Greek yogurt and walnuts' crunchiness.
Despite being filled with muscle-building proteins, this overnight oats recipe has one of the most popular flavors in the United States: peanut butter. When you taste these oats, you'll sense the peanut butter complemented by the apple's juiciness and mouth-watering aroma.
Can I let you in on a secret? This chocolate overnight oats recipe with over 1000 calories is my favorite. It's filled with proteins, complex carbohydrates and, on top of it all, has a delicious cocoa taste with bursts of flavor coming from goji berries. You'll also enjoy almonds' crunchiness.
If you want to learn how to make your own high-calorie overnight oats recipe or modify any of our recipes, you should know the best ingredients you can use.
In short, to prepare overnight oats that will help you gain weight, you'll need the following ingredients:
Let's explore each ingredient group above, so you have much more choices.
Although oats are the core of any overnight oats recipe, the kind of oats you choose makes a difference when it comes to the final texture and total calories.
The best type of oats for making overnight oats are rolled oats since they attract more water. This way, they will get softer after soaking in the fridge. This is because the rolled oats' outer structure was disrupted in a process called kilning. According to a 2021 study of oat-based foods, kilning "softens the texture of the flakes, thus enhancing mouthfeel and partially gelatinizing the starch in the product."
Wondering whether all oats have the same calories? No, but they're very close, as the comparison table below shows.
| Oat type | Calories/100 g (3.5 oz) |
|---|---|
| Rolled oats | 382 |
| Steel-cut oats | 381 |
| Quick oats | 379 |
| Instant oats | 362 |
The oats that will help you the most to gain weight are rolled oats. This is because they make it a tiny bit easier to get into a caloric surplus (eat more calories than you consume).
You can find oats in most physical stores and online. Some well-known oat brands are Quaker, McCann's, and Bob's Red Mill.
If you're intolerant to gluten, you'll be happy to know that oats are naturally gluten-free. However, some oats can get contaminated when made in facilities where they use wheat, barley or other gluten-containing products. The solution? Pick oats that state on their label they're gluten-free. Luckily, many of the big oat brands offer truly gluten-free alternatives.
When making overnight oats, you need a wet ingredient to soak the oats in overnight. That's how the oats end up soft in the morning.
Here are some of the ingredients you can soak your oats in:
| Wet ingredients | Calories/100 g (3.5 oz) |
|---|---|
| Whole milk | 61 |
| Lowfat milk | 42 |
| Skim milk | 34 |
| Coconut milk (canned) | 197 |
| Almond milk | 19 |
| Oat milk | 48 |
| Full fat Greek yogurt | 94 |
| 2% fat Greek yogurt | 73 |
| Nonfat Greek yogurt | 59 |
| Cream cheese | 350 |
| Heavy cream | 343 |
| Whipped cream | 257 |
| Ice cream | 207 |
| Hot water | 0 |
Opting for ingredients like yogurt or cream instead of more watery ingredients, like milk, will result in creamier overnight oats. If you opt for creamier ingredients for soaking, mix them with the oats to ensure all the oats get their share of water.
Unless you're a vegan, the best milk for bulking is animal milk because it has more muscle-building proteins than plant-based types of milk, like oat milk. The same goes for the yogurt versus plant-based yogurt debate. Nevertheless, if calories are your only target, coconut milk reigns supreme with its 197 calories per 100 g.
When you want more proteins from your overnight oats, you can add some protein powder or some egg whites. Make sure to mix these add-ins thoroughly in your wet ingredient of choice before adding them over the oats.
If you want to get your overnight oats' calories to the next level, add some high-calorie toppings.
Here are some ideas:
Regarding chocolate, the darker it is, the more calories it will bring to your overnight oats.
For extra vitamins, minerals, and flavor, you can add fruits and vegetables, like a mashed banana or some grated carrots.
If you prefer your overnight oats to be on the sweeter side, you can add some sweeteners.
Here are some ideas:
Keep in mind that all these sweeteners are considered added sugars. To make your overnight oats respect the healthy guidelines in the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, you don't want more than 10% of their calories to come from added sugars.
To bring the chef's kiss to your overnight oats, you can add some vanilla extract, cinnamon, or even pumpkin pie spice. Also, a touch of salt will bring all the different flavors to life.
Overnight oats are so easy to make that the only equipment you'll need is a plastic, glass, ceramic (like mugs) or any other food-safe container to store them into. However, we advise against plastic containers to avoid potential harmful microplastics. Also, if your container doesn't have a lid, cover the container before letting the oats soak in the fridge. And in case you want to eat the oats on the go, use portable containers, like jars.
Obviously, you'll also need a fridge or a cool place to place the containers once they're filled with your overnight oats of choice. Of course, you'll need a spoon to eat them.
When choosing the container, ensure the mouth is wide enough to easily spoon out the contents. Also, ensure that the container is big enough to fit all the ingredients.
To save time, you can make 3-5 portions of overnight oats on a Sunday, place them in the fridge and eat them until the next weekend. To ensure freshness, we recommend refrigerating the oats in airtight jars and eating them in 3-5 days. If you the overnight oats for longer, you can freeze them.
As you could see from our recipes, overnight oats can have many flavors, depending on the ingredients used. Also, since overnight oats are usually served cold, they can make for better choices during summer. When sweater weather arrives, you can switch overnight oats for oatmeal to warm you up from the inside out.
Our high-calorie overnight oats can bring many health benefits. Let's explore some of them.
Our recipes help you gain muscle because they all have the following characteristics:
Let's delve deeper into each of the characteristics above.
Since each our recipes deliver around 1000 calories per serving, which is half of a 2000-calorie diet, they will help you keep a caloric surplus. The dishes have so many calories because they are made with many good sources of calories, like oats, nut butters and some of the fruits with the most calories.
If you don't know what caloric surplus means, know it's eating more calories than you consume. And it's essential for building muscle. The International Society of Sports Nutrition has the same position. In 2017, after reviewing over 140 scientific articles, they concluded that people who want to build muscle efficiently should follow diets that get them into a "sustained caloric surplus."
You can eat high-calorie overnight oats when cutting as well. In this case, you'll need to make sure you stay on a caloric deficit.
Since all of our overnight oats have around 40 g of protein per serving, they can help you maximize your muscle-building efforts. Good news for those of you bodybuilding.
Wondering how do you maximize the rate you're gaining muscle? Trying to find out how much protein can the body use in a single meal for muscle-building, researchers came to the following conclusion.
"To maximize anabolism one should consume protein at a target intake of 0.4 g/kg/meal across a minimum of four meals in order to reach a minimum of 1.6 g/kg/day. Using the upper daily intake of 2.2 g/kg/day reported in the literature spread out over the same four meals would necessitate a maximum of 0.55 g/kg/meal," Brad Schoenfeld and Alan Aragon concluded in 2018.
For example, to maximize muscle-building, a 176 lbs (80 kg) individual needs 32-44 g of protein from one meal. Do you remember how much protein our overnight oats recipes have? Around 40 g.
One of the vitamins that impacts muscle growth and is found naturally in many of our overnight oats is vitamin B12. Researcher Lindsay Allen states that one of B12's roles is to restore methionine, an amino acid used in protein synthesis.
Besides B12, another compound that is present in our oat dishes and improves muscle growth is choline. The researchers behind a 2020 review of scientific studies that examined choline highlighted the compound's contribution to muscle growth and physical performance.
Our overnight oats recipes fight muscle cramps and reduce muscle damage during exercise. Thus, performance increases. The bars do this because they contain ingredients that contain vitamin E.
A 2013 Nephro-Urology Monthly study of 20 patients with renal disease showed Vitamin E significantly reduces muscle cramps.
Moreover, a 2009 study of 21 participants published in The Journal of Physiological Sciences reached interesting results. The researchers concluded that vitamin E supplementation protects against oxidative stress and muscle damage.
More recently, a 2022 review published in Nutrients showed that even a low dose of vitamin E could prevent "exercise-induced muscle damage."
Another mineral you get from consuming our overnight oats is zinc. And guess what? Oats, the core ingredient of all our recipes, are a good source of zinc.
According to a 2020 Redox Biology review, zinc helps form new muscular cells and regenerate depleted muscle tissues.
No matter when you eat them, our high-calorie overnight oats can energize you for many hours. They're rich in complex carbs, low in added sugars and abundant in vitamins and minerals that help your body produce energy.
The American Heart Association backs this up. Complex carbohydrates will give you energy for a longer period than simple carbs, like the ones found in white bread or candies. Also, they won't spike your blood sugar as much as simple carbs.
The only added sugar in our overnight oats recipes comes from honey. And we made sure the sugar from honey doesn't surpass the recommendation of the 2020-2025 edition of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans. According to the DGA, the calories we get from the added sugar in our diet should not exceed 10% of our daily calories.
Besides carbohydrates, our overnight oats have compounds that help the body get and use the energy found in foods. These compounds are:
Let's look at some proof regarding the above micronutrients' roles.
A 2020 scientific review of B vitamins, vitamin C, iron, magnesium, and zinc is titled "vitamins and minerals for energy, fatigue, and cognition."
When it comes to phosphorus, the National Institutes of Health describes it as a component of "the body's key energy source, adenosine triphosphate (ATP)."
The same NIH states that copper is involved in energy production.
As for manganese, a 2015 article reviewed manganese's effects on health. The research states that the mineral plays a role in significant physiological processes, including energy metabolism.
Our granola bars also contain chromium, which "might play a role in carbohydrate, lipid, and protein metabolism," according to the NIH.
Besides, a 2022 study on 138 soccer players states from its beginning that molybdenum plays an important role in adapting our bodies to physical training.
Our high-calorie overnight oats recipes strengthen your bones and connective tissues because most of them contain calcium, copper, manganese, boron, and vitamin C.
A 2012 review of the essential nutrients for bone health agrees. It found that calcium, copper, manganese, boron, and vitamin C are commonly used to improve bone health.
Since you don't have to cook them, you can make any of our overnight oats recipes in only 5 minutes. Prepare them in the evening and leave the oats in the fridge during the night to have them ready by the next morning.
If you don't have time for them in the evening, you can prepare the oats in the morning and consume them as a late breakfast or snack after a few hours of refrigerating them.
To save even more time, you can meal prep servings for the whole week ahead on a Sunday.
Since they're so customizable, overnight oats can be more or less healthy, depending on the ingredients used to make them and the person consuming them.
There is no evidence showing that letting oats in the fridge overnight will negatively affect their nutritional value.
Unfold Today has rigorous sourcing principles adhering to the top journalistic standards, so our writers always look for official, experienced, and first-hand sources. Read more about how we keep our content trustworthy and updated by reading our editorial process.
