Delicious Homemade Granola | Fresh P

Delicious Homemade Granola | Fresh P

we love cereal every year Americans spend 7.7 billion do on cereal it’s 11 billion dollar worldwide 92% of American households in the past year have bought cereal 92% that’s a lot of aggra dollars going to line the pockets of big huge huge companies like craft General Mills Kellogg Foods so I’m going to show you a delicious way to make something so much better than anything you can buy in a box today we’re going to make granola for this recipe I’m going to use oats oat brand and puffed amarinth you can use any kind of puffed grain you’d like and what it does is it just makes your cereal a little bit lighter I’m going to use almonds walnuts and pistachios but you could use any kind of nut or nut combination that you like for the fruit I’m going to use dried unsweetened coconut chips and raisins I’m going to go with maple syrup as my sweetener and orange zest zest of one or two oranges makes this granola fantastic you can use any kind of fat you’d like my my two favorites are coconut oil and butter so I’m going to use coconut oil for this recipe today so measure out your oil so we’re going to use one cup of liquid and that’s oil and sweetener combined so I want 1/3 part oil and 2/3 part sweetener [Music] if your coconut oil is solid at room temperature you want to melt it so I’m going to put this on very low low heat okay while that’s melting we’ll measure out our dry ingredients so everything all your dry ingredients are going to go into your bowl except your fruit [Music] I also have a little tiny bit of flax powder left over from a recipe so I’m just going to toss that in two parts of nuts so I’m going almond pistachios and some walnuts once you’ve measured out your nuts go ahead and chop them [Music] okay I gauged that by my almonds when most of my almonds are chopped up at least chopped in half then that’s good enough I’m also going to add in a little bit of black sesame these are loaded with calcium they have more calcium than milk and sesame and flax seeds and for a little color a few pumpkin seeds okay I think I probably went over my one part nuts but you can see it’s a super flexible recipe and you can just play with [Music] it I’m going to add a pinch of salt a pretty decent Siz pinch and I’m going to flavor it with the peel of this is a tangelo but you can use an orange if you don’t have a zester you can just take a knife and just cut the peel off in a really thin thin sheet as thin as you can what you’re after is there’s so much flavor in this outer orange part but this white part is really bitter so you want to get as little of the white part as possible and then you can just take this and really finely shave it into little slivers and these guys you add in there is so much flavor in this that these little pieces of orange rind and even pieces of lemon rind are so delicious I have one of these little zesters there’s five little tiny holes with little razors and you just take it and you drag it along your fruit and it peels off these beautiful little long curly cues of zest I like these little shards CU I think they’re interesting and they look beautiful in the finished product and I do it over the bowl because when you’re doing this there’s so much oil in this skin that the oil is shooting out and spraying off I can see it flying away from the orange so if you do that over your bowl rather than your cutting board all of that essence of orange and that juice is going right into your granola which is what you want you can also use a potato peeler and you can just peel off a thin sheet and it peels it with no white pain so those are three options for you however whatever you whatever tool you have and however you like go ahead and just zest your orange into the bowl you can also use a micr plan [Music] too so here’s this I’m just going to roll my orange into my ingredients and get all that yummy oil off of it and you can eat this guy later now mix it up really well you don’t want any dry ingredients you want that syrup or honey or whatever you’re using in that oil to coat every little piece you want to divide your granola between two sheet pans dividing it up instead of doing it all in one round we’ll ensure that your granola gets toasted evenly but also it makes it a lot easier to stir in between [Music] batches spread it out into a thin even layer so this particular granola is flavored mainly with maple syrup and orange peel but you could certainly use ground spices like cinnamon cardamom you could use vanilla could use lemon peel and of course of course the fruit in the nuts now your granola is ready for the oven you want to bake it slowly at 275 for about 45 to 55 even 60 Minutes it just depends on the toastiness and um the moisture content basically in your liquid so what you’re looking for is just a slightly very very light brown overall color you want it to be even so I’m going to set the timer in 15minute intervals and I’m going to stir it twice during baking just to ensure that the pieces from the outside that toast faster get integrated into the middle and face first [Music] that so my granola has been in the oven for a total of 30 minutes I can hear the difference I can hear that it’s drying out it sounds a little more brittle and dry and a little less moist but it still needs a little more time and it hasn’t darkened up at all you don’t want it brown but just for the oats to turn just a shade darker all right back in the oven [Music] so when your granola is ready it will be just slightly toasty Brown as it is and it will feel nice and dry and this definitely does so at this point go ahead and add in your dried fruit so I’m going to leave this granola on the counter for 45 minutes or so and let it cool completely before I put it in my airtight container so this particular batch of granola is flying to Connecticut today is my father-in-law’s 81st birthday so this one’s for you Bill we love you and hope you have a happy happy birthday to the rest of you thanks for being here I’ll see you next time [Music] he [Music]

A crisp granola that actually shatters between your teeth. It’s delightful.
I like to use a ratio as a guide when I’m making granola. In general a 4:2:1:1 ratio is ideal. 4 parts grain, 2 parts nuts, 1 part seeds and 1 part sweetener/fat in a 2/3 sweet, 1/3 fat ratio.

So it looks something like this:
INGREDIENTS
4 cups thick cut rolled oats or a combo of puffed grains and oat bran
2 cups nuts, your choice
1 cup seeds: sunflower, sesame, flax, hemp, chia and/or pumpkin
2/3 cup sweetener, I prefer maple syrup, honey or palm sugar
1/3 cup fat, butter or coconut oil are my favorites
1/2 tsp salt
Grated zest of 1-2 oranges, lemons or limes
1 cup dried fruit: currants, raisins, dried apricot, cherries, blueberries, pears, mangos, cranberries, goji, pineapple, bananas, etc.

Bonus ingredient: 2 cups coconut chips, I toss these in and bake them so they get toasty. I LOVE coconut and find that my favorite granolas are always heavy on the coconut.

DIRECTIONS
Preheat your oven to 275 degrees Fahrenheit (135 Celsius) with racks on the top and bottom third of the oven.

If you’re using a solid oil such as coconut (wintertime) or butter, melt it together with your sweetener in a small pan set over a low flame just until melted.

Combine the oats, nuts, seeds, orange zest, salt, and sweetener/oil in a large bowl. Be sure that you don’t add the fruit in at this point, it will overcook and get very hard, coconut it the exception, it’s lovely toasted. Mix your granola very well, you want all of the pieces coated with the liquid. Divide the mixture between the two baking sheets, spreading it evenly.

Bake for 45-55 minutes, stirring at 15 minute intervals. Rotate the pans from top to bottom to ensure even cooking. When the granola is slightly toasty, but not dark, it’s done.

Remove from the oven, add in your fruit and allow it to cool completely. Store in an airtight container. Enjoy this deliciously crisp and tasty granola plain, as a snack, sprinkled over yogurt or with cut fruit and/or milk.

Some lovely flavor combinations are:
Cashew with cinnamon and candied ginger
Almond, orange and cranberry
Walnut with figs and vanilla
Pecan with pear and cardamom
Walnut with orange and fennel
Macadamia nut with pineapple and mango
Cashew and Brazil nut with dates and apricots
Pistachio, walnut and almond with cinnamon and raisin
Pistacio w/ apricot, sesame and honey

My BE.U.TI.FUL jacket was custom made by my amazingly talented girlfriend Holly Higdon-Wood. She is a designer starting her own line of coats under her Colony label. Check out her Etsy site: http://www.etsy.com/people/hollyhigdonwood

MUSIC
Wise Moon by Serg
7 by Old Dada Weatherman