Crunchy Granola Bites

Do you like granola bars?

I do, but unless you get some expensive organic brand, you probably don't like what you see on the side of the box.

You know, the likes of high fructose corn syrup...  partially hydrogenated oil.... artificial flavoring...

Ech.  Not ideal for a supposedly "healthy" breakfast or snack.

My friend, Super Mom Natalie, already shared with you her fabulous recipe for granola, but sometimes I want something that doesn't require a bowl.

Something I can easily grab and eat on the go.

Like a granola bar.  But without all that bad stuff.

So that's why I made these.  They are full of wholesome goodies like oatmeal, flax seeds, almonds, and pumpkin seeds, and wheat germ.

Also, if you're feeling crazy, they are easily customizable to whatever you're craving at the moment.  Raisins, cranberries, pecans, mini chocolate chips (I won't tell if you won't!), sesame seeds - anything your little heart desires.

But nooo hydrogenated oils or corn syrup in these bad boys.

And they're more fun than a granola bar because they are bite-sized.

Everything is more fun when it's mini :)

Crunchy Granola Bites

• 1 1/2 C. old-fashioned oats
• 1/4 C. flax seeds
• 1/4 C. sliced almonds
• 1/4 C. pumpkin seeds
• 1/2 C. shredded coconut
• 1/4 C. wheat germ
• 2 T. blonde coconut palm sugar (or light brown sugar is fine)
• 1 T. molasses
• 2 T. honey
• 1 T. agave nectar
• 1 T. almond butter
• 4 T. Earth Balance spread (or butter)
• 2 t. pure vanilla extract
• 1/8 - 1/4 t. salt (to taste)

Preheat oven to 300 degrees.  Grease a 24-cup mini-muffin tin and set aside.

Combine oats, flax seeds, almonds, pumpkin seeds, coconut, and wheat germ on a rimmed baking sheet and spread into an even layer.  Bake 20 minutes, stirring every 6 or 7 minutes, until ingredients are lightly toasted.

Meanwhile, combine sugar, honey, molasses, agave, almond butter, and Earth Balance spread in a small saucepan on stove.  Heat over medium-low, stirring until melted, and bring to a gentle simmer.  Stir occasionally, lowering heat if necessary to prevent burning, until oats are done.

Empty oat mixture from baking sheet into a bowl, and stir.  Remove sugar syrup from stove, and add vanilla and salt.  Pour syrup over oats in bowl, and stir to coat mixture well.

Increase oven heat to 325 degrees, then divide granola mixture among cups of prepared mini-muffin tin (I used a small cookie dough scoop to distribute evenly).  Press mixture firmly into cups - you want the mixture to adhere to itself, otherwise you'll just end up with cups of loose granola!

Bake in pre-heated oven for 13-15 minutes until golden.  Let bites sit in pan for 10 minutes before removing and cooling completely on wire rack.

Original Recipe

Roasted Pumpkin Seeds

As I've already mentioned, Halloween is my favorite holiday - it has been since I was a kid.  I still love it for much of the same reasons as I did as a child... namely, being scared and eating lots of candy & pumpkin seeds.  I mean, costumes are fun too but horror movies and treats take the cake!

As long as you don't eat too many and get a big belly...

I know.  You wish you could look that good in a penguin suit.

I don't dress up much these days, but I did make an exception for my nieces' joint birthday party yesterday - they turned one and three years old.  Here they are with their dad and grandpa (better known to you as my stepdad Chris Vittles):

I thought about resurrecting The Penguin but instead went as a witch.

Mr. Vittles was a hockey player, which is not much of a stretch, as he "dresses up" in that costume about once a week for his Mens' League hockey games.  But I thought we might have another hockey player on our hands when Chloe asked Mr. V if she could borrow his hockey stick:

Are elephants and Winnie the Pooh balls are allowed on the rink?

After the party, Mr. V and I finally picked up some pumpkins for carving.  We didn't get any when we went apple-picking because we were afraid they'd be rotten.  But then apparently we waited too long, because every place we tried to get them Friday night was all out!

We did eventually find them yesterday, and we each got one to carve.  Considering today is Halloween and it was already so late in the day, I planned on doing something simple.  But Mr. V (who is apparently a bird whisperer now) said that our parrot CJ "told him" she wanted me to carve her likeness into a pumpkin.

I'm pretty sure the only thing CJ tells anyone is "Hi," but I can't resist a good challenge.  So I made a silhouette of her on a branch outlined by the moon.  It certainly won't be winning any prizes but you get the idea:

Mr. V made a very creative one as well - he decided to pay tribute to our boat:

However, during the carving process I noted that he is definitely not down with the pumpkin seeds.  He wanted nothing to do with picking them out of the pumpkin guts, apparently because he doesn't like to eat the roasted seeds. 

Now I love me some pumpkin seeds, so I was dutifully fishing each one out and saving them in a plastic colander.  But at that rate, Mr. V would be done carving his entire pumpkin before I finished, so I suggested that if he wasn't going to help me pick out the seeds then he should clean out the inside of my pumpkin.

Naturally he chose seed hunting, but he was not a happy camper.  "This is a pain in the *#$," he complained.

I pointed out, "So are you."

"That's true," he conceded, "it takes one to know one.  But so is this."

We only do this one a year though, so it was all worth it.  CJ agrees.

Roasted Pumpkin Seeds

Boil seeds in heavily salted water for 10 minutes.  Drain in colander, and spread seeds on paper towels.  Blot dry.

Preheat oven to 300 degrees.  Spray rimmed baking sheet with nonstick Canola oil spray.  Spread out seeds in a single layer and spray with more Canola oil.  Sprinkle generously with salt.

Bake 45 - 60 minutes or until browned, stirring seeds every 15 minutes and re-spraying & salting as necessary.

Recipe origin unknown

Homemade Granola

On this last day of August, I have got a treat for you - a guest post by Natalie Vittles!

She has been kind enough to take some time out of her busy schedule to share not only her super-secret and super-delicious homemade granola recipe, but also a little history of how it came to be!

Ahhh!!
 
I'm not sure which I'm more excited about.

You be the judge.  Enjoy :)

As Maggie mentioned in her last post, I don't have a lot of spare time on my hands these days. I am a mother to a very rambunctious 3 year old boy and a happy-go-lucky, but still needy 5 month old infant. Oh and I just started law school.  I ever-so-wisely rode the late pregnancy hormone-induced wave of ambition straight into that logistical calamity.

As you may have guessed, a lot of my time-consuming stay-at-home-mom-with-a-perfectionist-hippie-streak obsessions have fallen by the wayside. While our first child was on a super strict cloth diaper regimen (which even included toting giant bags of soiled linens on vacation) our second receives this conscience-soothing treatment in increasingly rare cases such as when the toosh isn't a little bit irritated, or when he isn't about to take a nap, or for that matter when dirty diapers aren't in queue behind 2 days of backlogged laundry - i.e almost never.

But there is one law school felled tradition that I quickly resurrected - making my own granola. It's just too good. It makes the store-bought stuff (even the organic, pumpkin seed, super omega, etc. stuff) seem like Cap'n Crunch in comparison. Nothing against the Cap'n, but that's dessert not breakfast.  

I had been making this recipe every week for a year, slowly changing things as I went along. Finding a good granola recipe to start with was no easy task. Even my trusty Mark Bittman, the man who taught me how to cook..well.."Everything..," left me with burnt and bland granola after way too many steps and way too many pans and bowls. I eventually adapted a recipe from Delicious Living magazine, a free handout at our local co-op. 

If you compare the recipes, you'll see that in the end I just added almond butter (to create the crunchy clumps), subtracted the coconut (because it really didn't add anything to the taste), and greatly reduced the cooking time (to avoid the burnt taste). Amazing how it took me a whole year to get to this point, but hindsight is 20/20. 

The final recipe is very adaptable and customizable. You can add different seeds, nuts and dried fruit for a completely new taste. It's equally as good with yogurt as it is with milk, which is a plus since I've been addicted to Greek yogurt lately. Is that stuff amazing or what?!  And I assure you that you do not need to be a domestic goddess like Ms. Vittles to make this recipe. If your idea of cooking is throwing ingredients into a giant bowl (or if you've just got a lot on your plate), this recipe is for you:

Homemade Granola

• 8 cups uncooked rolled oats
• 1/2 cup sunflower seeds
• 1/2 cup sesame seeds
• 1/2 cup pumpkin seeds
• 1 cup almonds, chopped or sliced
• 3/4 cup maple syrup
• 1/4 cup honey
• 1/2 cup sunflower oil*
• 1 TB Molasses
• 1 TB vanilla extract
• 1 heaping spoonful (or more) Almond Butter
• cinnamon
• salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl, mix first 5 dry ingredients. Make well and add in next 6 ingredients. Stir to combine. Press mixture into two jelly roll pans and sprinkle with a little bit of salt and a lot of cinnamon. Bake for 15 minutes. Remove from oven, stir, and bake for 10 additional minutes. Remove granola from pans immediately (otherwise it will stick) and put in resealable bag or storage container. I keep mine in the same giant Pyrex bowl that I used to mix the ingredients. After it comes out of the oven you can add dried fruit to the recipe.

*Any neutral, high heat oil could probably be used if sunflower oil isn't available.

Recipe Adapted (by Natalie) from Delicious Living Mag.com