Someone passed along a recipe for oatmeal with smashed banana and chocolate chips. Obviously this isn't a breakfast you can or should have every day, or even every other day -- but sometimes you want something a little decadent first thing in the morning. And it's still good for you, especially if you use dark chocolate chips.

Needless to say, this recipe was wonderful -- but it needed some tinkering with.

For my taste, it was too thin. More importantly, it was much too sweet. It called for a lot of brown sugar -- and this was in addition to mashed banana and chocolate chips stirred right into the oatmeal. That's a bit much, even for me. If the lady who's happy to eat chocolate for breakfast is saying that, something needs fixing.

So I played around with it and came up with something that didn't send me into a sugar coma just when I should have been starting my day.

Here, then, is my own version of chocolate-chip banana oatmeal. This makes enough for two people, if those two people can content themselves with one generous bowlful each. If that's not the case, you might want to double it.

In a medium saucepan, bring between 1 1/2 and 1 3/4 cups of water to a full boil. Stir in:

One cup rolled oats
Pinch of salt

Let this simmer, uncovered, for about five minutes, stirring frequently. Then turn off the heat, cover it, and let it sit for three minutes.

In the mean time, mash:

One ripe banana.

After the oatmeal has cooled and thickened for these few minutes, stir in the mashed banana.

You now have a choice. You can either have oatmeal that's chocolaty all the way through, or banana oatmeal with a topping of chocolate chips. (I would recommend mini chips either way.)

If you want chocolate oatmeal, stir the chips in while the oatmeal is still good and hot. You'll really have to decide for yourself how much is enough in terms of how many chips to use. Start with a quarter cup and see how it looks from there. Half a cup is probably the upper limit even for a chocolate fiend.

If you want chocolate chips that still hold their shape a bit, uncover the banana oatmeal and let it cool a bit. Better yet, serve it out into bowls -- it will cool more quickly.

When it's warm but not hot, sprinkle mini chocolate chips on top.

Either way, this recipe is very good with a little milk on top; but if you're after antioxidant value, bear in mind that current medical research indicates that having milk with this will cancel out all antioxidant benefits.

No matter how you have it, remember to enjoy it. That's the point of breakfast, isn't it?