Homemade Granola
Tuesday, December 29, 2009 at 12:00PM After the Christmas cookie baking bonanza of 2009, I had quite a few baking ingredients left over: molasses, chocolate chips (regular, mini, and white), various sugars, almonds, and cranberries. Most of these will get used at some point, I have no doubt . . . but the almonds and cranberries? I didn't want them just sitting around and so I started to wonder what I could do with them. My first thought was muffins, but I can't stand muffins so that was clearly a no-go.
And then I remembered the granola recipe I wanted to try from Relaxed Cooking with Curtis Stone. I took a peek at it and, voila! - it needs cranberries and almonds! We had a winner!

Homemade Granola
from Relaxed Cooking with Curtis Stone
4 tbsp unsalted butter
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
1 tbsp freshly grated nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup pure maple syrup (I used Splenda sweetened syrup)
1/4 cup packed light brown sugar
2 cups rolled oats (not instant) (I used Irish steel cut oats)
1 cup shelled pumpkin seeds
1 cup shelled sunflower seeds
1 cup whole almonds (I used slivered since that's what I had)
1/2 cup dried cranberries
1/2 cup raisins
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Combine the butter, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves in a small, heavy saucepan over medium heat, and stir for 1 minute or until the butter has completely melted. Add the honey, maple syrup, and brown sugar and stir for 2 minutes, or until the sugar dissolves and the mixture comes to a simmer. Set it aside.
Spray a large, heavy baking sheet with non-stick cooking spray (I used a silpat instead of cooking spray). Combine the oats, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, and almonds in a large bowl. Drizzle the warm syrup over the oat mixture and toss to coat well. Transfer the oat mixture to the prepared baking sheet, forming an even layer. Bake, stirring occasionally, for 30 minutes, or until the mixture is dry. (I stirred it 3x.)
Stir in the cranberries and raisins and continue baking for 10 minutes, or until the granola darkens slightly. (At this point the granola will still be soft, but as it cools it will become crunchy.) Transfer the baking sheet to a cooling rack and let the granola cool completely. It will set into chunks, so simply break it up into smaller bits.
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If the hubby and I didn't already have dinner plans last night, I would have totally sat down with a bowl of the granola, poured some milk on it, and chowed down. I put a bunch in my yogurt this morning - yum, yum, yummy, yum, yum. This is great stuff - and I love knowing exactly what goes into what I'm eating. I look forward to making this again and changing the ingredients around. Imagine chopped dried apples in the mix? Mmmm...




















