Kitchen-Scraps Granola

I don’t do granola with yogurt often for breakfast, but I know a lot of people do.  Usually, both the yogurt and the granola are store-bought, which means they tend to have lots of added sugar (which isn’t required to be disclosed on labels- yet).  That doesn’t make me feel particularly good a few hours after breakfast.  Also, store-bought granola is expensive!  So, for the past six or seven years, if I do eat granola, I make sure to make it myself.  I use the formula here to create a no-recipe granola that changes every time I make it.

Granola is a great way to get your hands dirty in the kitchen with very little pressure for perfection.  There are hundreds of varieties and most of them taste really good.   Store-bought granola tends to have way too much sweetness, and it always seems to be more dry and crumbly than crunchy and chewy.  At home, you get the control over ingredients and texture, so it always turns out the way you want it to!

As a “recipe,” granola allows for a lot of flexibility.  The basic template should be:

• 5-6 parts (of any size) dry goods, with somewhere around half being oats
• 1 part liquid goods, about half sweet/sticky and half oily
• Salt, to taste (i.e. more than you think), and any other spices/extracts you desire
• Mix liquid into dry in a huge bowl
• Spread on sheet pan and bake around 250-300F for 30-60 minutes, stirring about every 15 minutes
• Once cooled, break into chunks and mix in dried fruit (optional)

Within this template, the rest is up to you. Typically, granola contain dry goods like nuts, seeds, dried fruit, chocolate chips, etc. in addition to rolled oats (not instant).  Before going grocery shopping, check your pantries and snack drawers for random odds and ends to use up. 

This time around, I found:

• A cup or so of pumpkin seeds left over from a cran-pumpkin tart I made (last year… oops)
• Chia seeds that have been in my freezer since before I last moved 
• A handful each of dried cherries and cranberries, shoved in the back of my baking shelf
• Mixed unsalted nuts that I bought by accident (who, in their right mind, chooses unsalted nuts?)
• Half a jar of pumpkin spice mix that is probably stale, and a lot of kosher salt

All I really needed to purchase were the oats, but I grabbed some unsweetened coconut from the bulk section as well for extra texture.  I roughly measured everything (except for the dried fruit, which should not be baked lest it burn into chewy little fruit-jerky bits… been there, done that) using a glass measuring cup, which was the closest thing within reach to figure out how many “parts” of dry I had.  It was about 6 measuring-cups full once combined.

For the liquid, I had half a bear-full of cheap honey and some canola oil, easy-peasy.  But this is a great way to use up that brown sugar that has turned into a rock, some neglected nut butter, or that coconut oil you bought while it was still a “health food”- again, check your pantry before shopping!  I whisked those together in the same measuring cup to reduce dishes.

This is the most important step: mix the liquid into the dry with your hands.  The best kitchen tool you have is attached to your arms.  Get to know how they work.  Feel like a kid again.

Spread on to a large sheet tray or two, lining with tinfoil if you’d like to cut down on dishes.  Bake, shifting things around with a spatula periodically, until the oats become light brown and the house smells like carmelized sugar and fresh cookies and happiness.

Does the baking process take a good amount of time? Yes, it does.  But you can very easily clean up, grind and brew a pour over coffee, do a yoga video, take a quick shower, edit some photos, and prep for tonight’s dinner while it’s in the oven.  Or at least that’s how I used the time.

At this point, you can stir again as soon as the granola comes out, if you like looser clumps, or you can let it cool and then break it into larger chunks.  Again, totally up to you- you’ll probably have more than enough to experiment doing half and half while you’re figuring things out.  The house, and your clothes, should smell intoxicatingly attractive at this point.

My version cost about half what a typical bag of premade granola costs and cleared out tons of room in my pantry, but instead of having only 4 cups of premade granola, I had enough to make 16 cups.

Stored in glass or plastic tubs, this will keep indefinitely.  I think I’m stuck with yogurt and granola breakfasts for a long time to come!