granola

Granola.  Doesn't it just conjure up feelings of goodness, of simplicity, of mornings with sunlight filtering through your windows and all being right with the world?

It does for me, anyway.

I have found two recipes I truly love, and I alternate making them both because I really can't choose a favorite.  Recently, while eating my bowl of homemade yogurt topped with delicious granola, I realized that perhaps I should share.

Share the recipes, not the granola, that is.  Although if you'd like to come visit, I'd be so happy to serve you some granola, and a cup of tea on the side.

But since most of you probably won't come visit, here's where you can find my favorite recipes.

Elise of Hungry Hungry Hippie has a delicious recipe for Quinoa Granola.  This has been my main go-to granola recipe since Elise posted it two years ago.  Very crunchy, lots of variety in it, this is maple-y cinnamon-y goodness.  However, if you're not the kind of person who keeps buckwheat groats, chia seeds, and quinoa on hand, making this recipe might necessitate a trip to the grocery store!

My modifications: I don't usually add the dried fruit to my granola, and I add more oats than called for.  For me, oats are the backbone of granola, and if I don't add some extra, this recipe is a little too seed-y for my taste, with lots of extra chia seeds and quinoa sifting through to the bottom of my container towards the end of each batch.

Jessica from How Sweet It Is recently posted a recipe for Coconut Butter Granola.  The Quinoa granola recipe now has some competition!  This stuff is amazing.  I think the use of honey rather than maple syrup makes the granola stick together in nice big clusters more than the quinoa granola recipe, and the coconut flavor in the granola is so delicious.  Jessica posted this recipe like two weeks ago, and I've just made my second batch of this granola, that's how good it is.

I made it without the unsalted butter, but used all coconut oil instead, and I omitted the vanilla bean paste because I'm not enough of a foodie to have any.  Oh well.  It still turned out amazing.  I also added a bit of raw quinoa to one batch, and I liked the added crunch factor.

I made my own coconut butter, using my food processor, to use for this recipe.  I've found that homemade coconut butter isn't quite as smooth as a jar of Artisana coconut butter, but since the one jar of Artisana I ever bought was about $13, and I could make a jar's worth of my own for $8 or less (two 8 oz bags worth - and you could get it for less if you ordered online somewhere or bought in bulk, I'm sure) of organic, unsweetened flaked coconut, that's a decent savings and makes it well worth the {small} sacrifice in texture, I think.  Especially since in this granola recipe, the creaminess of the coconut butter won't matter at all!  It's just going to be mixed in with all the crunch of the granola, allowing the coconut flavor to permeate everything.  Yum!

Now go make some granola!