Muesli

Muesli, also spelled müsli, is a Swiss dish of rolled oats, nuts and dried or fresh fruit that is prepared without cooking. It is mainly eaten at breakfast, though it also appears at snacks and suppers.

History

Muesli dates from around 1900, when the Swiss physician Maximilian Bircher-Benner created it for patients in his hospital, where a diet rich in fresh fruit and vegetables was central to treatment. According to his own account, he was inspired by a simple dish he and his wife had been served on a walk in the Alps, though the details of that meal belong more to anecdote than to documented record.

The original recipe was quite different from today's. Rolled oats were soaked in water, then served the next morning with grated apple, skin and core included, nuts, lemon juice, and cream with honey or sweetened condensed milk. Over time, variations multiplied, with other grains, fruits, dairy products and plant milks. Packaged muesli is now a dry mix that is moistened with milk, yoghurt or juice when eaten.

For decades it was a familiar food across central Europe. In the English-speaking world it grew in popularity from the 2010s, often under the name overnight oats, which describes the practice of soaking the oats the night before.

Culture

In Switzerland and much of continental Europe, muesli is a everyday part of breakfast. Its link to the early twentieth-century reform movement, which valued natural foods and vegetarianism, helped establish its reputation as a healthy choice.

Two main forms coexist on the market: homemade muesli, prepared with seasonal produce, and packaged versions combining oats or cornflakes, wheat or rye flakes, nuts, seeds and dried fruit, sometimes with honey, spices or chocolate. In home preparations, a typical balance is about 80 percent grain, 10 percent nuts and seeds and 10 percent dried fruit.

In English-speaking countries, cafés and restaurants often serve Bircher muesli as a dressed-up version of the original, with grated fresh fruit, orange or apple juice and more varied toppings such as berries, pears or vanilla. These dishes are usually a considerable adaptation rather than a faithful copy of Bircher-Benner's recipe.

Trivia