I like granola.
When I was a little girl my dad’s sister, Aunt Marty, tried to extol the virtues of granola, carob, and bean curd to a 9 year old who doesn’t really care about gross stuff like that. Bring on the chocolate, baby!!!
Now that I am much older and wiser, I find that granola isn’t half bad. In fact, it is delicious! It is fairly healthy too. Making my own makes me feel like a hippy. I feel like I need to have long hair, wear mis-matched clothing and stop shaving. I could never be a hippy. I can’t stand carob, tofu, mismatched clothing or prickly armpits.
I get almost giddy at making something myself for less than half the cost of store bought, and tastes better too. I like foiling the system!
I like being a rebel.
Making granola is so easy. It just takes a long time to bake.
This is what you do. ~~Check out the recipe over to the side~~.

Make sure you have everything. You can make substitutions and even add in dry fruit after you bake it, but I am not a fan of dried fruit. I like to add fresh to mine.

In a VERY large bowl, put 6 cups of oats~~not the quick kind~~

Some slivered almonds

cashew bits~~my favorite nut,~~

sunflower seeds

and oat bran.

Mix well.

Doesn’t that look wonderful? I almost feel guilty liking something this good for me.
Almost. I do like broccoli, too.

In another bowl~~dontcha just love this little bowl? It is so cute, so homey, so old fashioned…sigh…sorry~~mix oil, maple syrup,

vanilla~~again, I don’t measure vanilla~~

and salt. Stir a bit to combine everything.

Pour into your oats. You need a very large bowl for this, because you have to

stir and stir and mix and fold till everything is coated.
It should look like this, and you will be able to arm wrestle a NFL defensive back when you are finished and win.

Then you divide it into 2 pans. I generally make this in 2 large jelly roll pans, but since we are using our summer kitchen, they don’t fit.
These do nicely in a pinch. I just have to bake them 15 minutes longer.

Into the oven it goes.

Set your handy-dandy timer for 15 minutes.

Stir when your timer goes off. Do this for at least an hour and 15 minutes.

When it is done, cool it. It will be all crisp and brown.

Store it in an airtight container.
You can eat it on ice cream, ~~I prefer hot fudge on my ice cream~~or sprinkled over yogurt.

Me, I will stick to eating it with flavored coffee creamer. Vanilla Toffee Carmel to be exact. I am still being healthy. It is granola after all! Go make some today. Be healthy, or at least pretend to be and eat some over yogurt.
Do you like tofu?