This morning the old granola jar was looking a little bit on the empty side, and since it’s already 90 degrees at 8:30 am, I thought it would be a good time to learn how to make my mom’s homemade granola recipe.  It’s actually quite easy, especially if the pantry is fully stocked and your mom is standing on the other side of the island, guiding you with helpful hints and the steps of preparing your dish.

Ingredients:

• 4 C. old fashioned oatmeal (you know I love me some oatmeal)
• 1 C. sliced almonds
• 1 C. whole almonds

• 1/2 C. packed brown sugar
• 1/2 tspn salt
• 1 tspn ground cinnamon
• 1/4 C. vegetable oil
• 1/4 C. honey
• 2 tspn vanilla

**You can add dried fruit if you like, but since I’m not a fan and I wore the chef’s hat, there would be no prunes or raisins to ruin my yogurt this week.

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 300 degrees

• In a bowl, mix the oats, almonds, brown sugar, salt, and cinnamon.

• In a microwave safe bowl, warm the oil and honey together for one minute in the microwave.  Carefully whisk in the vanilla after the oil and honey have been heated; the chemistry fails me, but when you add in the vanilla and stir, it causes a lot of boiling.  I imagine a Wicked Witch of the West sort of thing happening.

• Carefully pour liquid over the oat mixture.  Stir gently with a wooden spoon; finish mixing by hand (if you wanna burn the crap out of your fingers…up to you).  Spread granola on a baking sheet.

• Bake for a total of 40 minutes.  After the first 20, pull out the baking sheet and give the granola a good storing just to ensure that there is no burning and you increase your chance of getting a nice oven rack shaped scar.  Repeat twice after an additional 10 minutes.
• Place the granola in a paper bag to cool.  This allows for additional oil to be absorbed.

ENJOY!