I LOVE granola. I love it plain, I love it with milk, and I love it on homemade yogurt. I am not much of a breakfast person (especially not a sweets at breakfast-type-person.) Granola would be the exception to that. However, granola is expensive. It is something we choose not to purchase, and I was okay with that. Until I started making yogurt... then I really wanted granola to top it off. The problem is, most of the recipes that I could find would be just as, if not more expensive than buying it. (What with all the nuts and dried fruits, etc.) So I finally stumbled across a simple, no frills recipe on Food Network's site that is perfect for me! I thought I'd share it with you too (because if you wanted to embellish it with other goodies-craisins, dried bananas, cashews, raisins, flax, all come to mind- you could do that too!)
Crunchy Granola
Prep time: 10 min; Cook time: 1 hour; Servings: 10 cups
Ingredients:
1.5 c. brown sugar
1/2 c. water
4 teas. vanilla
1 teas. salt
8 c. rolled oats (I used old-fashioned, not sure if that's the same, but it worked great)
some chopped pecans, walnuts, slivered almonds (it called for 2 c., I put in much less because I'm cheap)
shredded coconut (Not in the original recipe, but I think it's a nice addition)
Directions:
-Preheat oven to 275 degrees F
-Line 2 cookie sheets with parchment paper and set aside
-Combine brown sugar and water in a 4-cup microwave safe glass measuring cup or bowl. Cook in microwave on high for 5 minutes until sugar is completely dissolved. Remove from microwave, add vanilla extract and salt.
-In a large mixing bowl, combine oats, nuts, and brown sugar syrup mixture. Stir until thoroughly mixed. Spread the granola onto cookie sheets and bake 45 minutes to 1 hour or until golden.
-When the mixture comes out of the oven, it is still very pliable. You could add in dried fruit at this point if you wanted. I like to break up the big clumps at this point, but that's truly a personal preference. When the granola has cooled completely, store in an airtight container.
3 comments:
I love making granola, it makes the whole house smell so good! I usually swap the vanilla for almond extract and that makes it smell even better!
This looks like a really easy recipe to try!! Thanks for posting!! YUM!!
Looks tasty! I'm a big granola person as well. I have a recipe I really like, but I'll have to give yours a whirl with the brown sugar. That would save quite a bit of money over the version I make with real maple syrup.
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