I have recently been inspired to dive back into the crunchy goodness of homemade granola. It has been a long time since I made granola but I lived off the stuff in college. (Yeah I know, big shock.)
Back then I made granola not because I had a great love of the homemade but I couldn't afford to buy the pre-made ones. Then I learned how much better I liked my own. My tiny little contraband dorm room toaster oven could crank out some fine tooth jarring goodness. Almost all of my ingredients came from the university cafeteria too. My little recipe involved things like 2 packets of syrup, 1/4 packet pilfered salt, 4 packets of oatmeal. It was almost a challenge to how far I could stretch my meal card dollar.
Chuck recently requested I make a granola recipe he heard on NPR (Nigella Lawson) and Kaileigh constantly wants "those crunchy things" so I decided to give it a try again. Where better to start than Alton's granola. I made one round of Nigella's granola bar and one round of Alton's. Alton's won. Nigella's was good but not what I was looking for. It was more of a granola bar. (Yes, I know thats what the title of the recipe is but I wanted variety.) It sadly sat in the pantry for weeks and has since been crushed with a hammer and is currently being enjoyed by visitors to my birdfeeder.
I now use Alton's basic recipe and alter the nuts and fruit each time to whatever I have on hand. Which seems to be inhaled by our family all too quickly. It is great as a cereal or you can toss some in yogurt or my fav, scoop out some in a bag and add a handful of M's and Kaileigh is happy.
fyi I won't hate you if you slum and use fake syrup. I have used the fake stuff several times recently. Keep in mind that mine got brown alot faster with fake syrup but it was wetter for some reason. low and slow is the key.
