Granola!

I LOVE GRANOLA!  I put it on top of fruit and yogurt.  It's my go-to meal.  I discovered that Harris Teeter made a decent granola without raisins and have been using that for quite a while.  I can often score it for $1.77/box, but when supplies run low I get antsy because I hate to pay $2.99 for it.  In fact, I get really mad at Tony, because he'll pour himself a generous bowl (like 1/3 of the box) and eat it as cereal with milk, and I end up running out of granola when I still have a tub of yogurt to eat. (Shame on me, I'm so selfish!)

So, several weeks ago, my friend Jessica casually suggested to me that I make my own granola.  It was sort of a fly-by comment and we moved on to talking about something else, but it stuck in the back of my head.  I occasionally searched online for a recipe, but found lots of gourmet recipes asking for ingredients I did not own (what's the point if you have to spend lots of money to make it??), or ingredients I'd never heard of (yikes... I'm not THAT adventurous!). 

Well, today I found THE ONE.  A basic granola recipe with ingredients I owned.  We were "stuck in the house with nothing to do", because you know, it snowed last night, and it's North Carolina, so everything shuts down.  OK, everything didn't really shut down, but I didn't have plans, so it was the perfect opportunity.  Abbie helped me put in all of the ingredients and mix it, and what came out was a fragrant, delicious granola that I LOVE!  I have no idea how it compares nutritionally to the HT brand, but I think it was definitely cheaper.  And who cares?  It was so easy, I'm totally making this again!

 I got the recipe here, but this is the simplified version of what I did:

Ingredients
3 cups old fashioned oats
1 small pack (2.25oz) sliced almonds
1/2 - 1 cup crispy rice cereal (I didn't measure)
2 Tbsp vegetable oil
6 Tbsp honey
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1 heaping teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 tsp kosher salt
1 Tbsp vanilla extract

Spray jelly roll pan with Pam.  Mix all ingredients well in a bowl and spread onto pan.  Place in oven, then turn over on to 300 F (I started with a cold oven like the original recipe suggested).  Bake for 30 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes.  Let cool on the pan (it will crisp up during this time).  Transfer to an air-tight container for storage.


If you are sensitive to salt, I'd recommend using less salt and adding another spice.  At first I was surprised by the salt taste, but now that I've had several spoonfuls, I actually really like it.  This granola is also flavorful enough that I don't feel the need to add extra honey like I would with the HT brand.  I also love that it has no preservatives!  A win-win all around!