Granola, your style...

Sweet and crunchy, granola is great served with milk for breakfast, stirred into your favorite yogurt or sprinkled over ice cream. Let your imagination run wild when you make homemade granola. The basic ingredients are cereal, oil, and a sweetener. Then add anything that you like to give it the character, taste, and nutrition that you want.

Granola is so easy to make, it hard to call it cooking. Since a little effort goes a long way, there are lots of cooking options. Shredded or flaked coconut is always good or various seeds and nuts are good terrific additions. There are no rules in making your own granola.

The fat in granola recipes is there to coat the oatmeal and make it crisp as it bakes, just the way olive oil is tossed on bread cubes when making croutons to make them crisp and toasty. Many recipes call for melted butter or margarine, but I like to use light olive oil instead. It does the coating job just as well and is better nutritionally.

Honey is the usual sweetener. I like to warm the honey in the microwave to make it pourable and then stir it into the oil. This method allows you to combine the liquids and drizzle the mixture over the dry cereal ingredients and get them well-coated. Most recipes call for raisins or some sort of chewy dried fruit. At times I've used dried cranberries, cherries, chopped dates or a handful of mixed dried fruit. Here's a word of warning. Do Not add them to the cereal mixture before baking or they will further dehydrate and get. Spare me embarrassment, and don't ask how I know this. Point is, stir in the dried fruit when you remove the granola from the oven.

Same thing goes for wheat germ, which adds a good dose of nutrition. The tiny, thin flakes can over-toast or even burn if not closely watched. Stir it in after the granola has baked. Most recipes don't tell you to do this. Chopped nuts add flavor and crunch. Almonds are most often included, but if you like pecans or walnuts and have them in the pantry, use them. Some recipes call for sunflower or pumpkin seeds. Again remember, you can add any ingredient you want. Cinnamon is a natural partner, and most recipes call for it. Sneak in a pitch of nutmeg -- about a quarter of a teaspoon -- for a rather exotic taste. Salt is usually not called for, but I always add a pinch to bring out the flavor in the other ingredients and also because by using olive oil as my fat of choice, there's a loss of the salt component usually found in butters and margarines.

The baking pan size, you choice, will affect the baking time. I like to bake my granola in a 9-by-13-inch glass Pyrex pan. But if you use a cookie sheet, the granola will bake and brown faster. Color and type of metal also affect the baking time. It's best to turn on the oven light and keep a watchful eye on the baking. When you begin to smell it, the granola is about done.


George’s Cherry Granola

Ingredients:
2 cups rolled oats, uncooked
¼ cup brown sugar
¼ teaspoon cinnamon
¼ teaspoon nutmeg (optional)
Salt to taste
⅓ cup slivered almonds, chopped
¼ cup honey, warmed to liquid
¼ cup light olive oil
½ cup dried cherries or other dried fruits

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.

In a large bowl, combine oats, brown sugar, cinnamon, salt and almonds. In a glass measure, warm honey until it is no longer sticky and thinner. Add olive oil to the honey and stir.

Drizzle the honey-oil over the dry ingredients and mix to combine. Spread the mixture on a baking sheet or in a 9-by-3-inch pan.

Bake granola until golden and crunchy, stirring once, anywhere from 15 to 25 minutes. It will depend on your pan. Stir in the dried cherries.

Makes about 3 cups

__________

George’s notes:

• You can make your own terrific trail mix with your homemade granola by just adding some M&M's, additional dried fruits & nuts and you have a great snack.
• Homemade Granola makes a great gift, especially for that ‘health-conscious’ friend.