granola

A couple of years ago, I bought a box of Harvest Crunch. As I picked up the box, I remembered how much I enjoyed that cereal during my college years and I had not had it for quite some time. For some reason, I did not appreciate it as much as I used to. Ok… that is putting it mildly. It was awful! Too sweet, too hard and the granola didn’t even look like granola! What are those rocky chunks?

Since then, every two weeks or so, I make a huge batch of granola from scratch. I was surprised at how easy it is to make. I just store it in an airtight container and it will last us a couple of weeks. I also keep various dried fruit on hand so that I can mix it up. I’m not a creature of habit and love variety.

Also, I’ve found that having granola in the morning with some yogurt keeps me more satisfied and less likely to get hungry by mid-morning.

This is my basic granola recipe:

Granola

Dry Ingredients

2c oats
1c coconut ribbon
1c sliced almonds (can be substituted with whatever nuts you like… walnut, pecans, macadamia…)
1 1/2t ground cardamom
1 1/2t ground cinnamon
pinch salt

Wet Ingredients

1/4c butter melted
2T grape seed oil
1/4c honey
2T maple syrup
1T brown sugar

Add after baking (in whatever combination you wish)

chopped candied ginger
chopped dried apricots
chopped dried cherries
dried blueberries
raisins

Instructions

Mix dry ingredients in a bowl. Whisk together wet ingredients and add to dry ingredients. Spread evenly on a 9”x13” baking sheet. Bake at 300°C for 20 mins, mix around, bake for another 30 mins checking every 10 mins and mix around.

 

Update

Someone brought to my attention that I had written granola as one of the ingredients but in fact, what I mean is oats. Please note the change.