Homemade Granola

When I was pregnant, I finally started eating breakfast regularly, and now I can't imagine missing it.

And because I'm now breastfeeding and oats are a galactagogue, I started eating a lot of oatmeal. I love oatmeal. I cook basic Publix-brand old fashioned oats with a big pinch of salt, a drizzle of honey and some ground cinnamon, and eat it with milk or soy milk and some kind of fruit, depending on the season. Sometimes it's blueberries, sometimes sliced bananas, sometimes dried prunes cut up with scissors.

But I don't want oatmeal every day. And something I gained a taste for while pregnant was granola. But storebought granola is horribly expensive, especially when you compare it to the cost of basic Publix-brand old fashioned oats. Which, seriously, is almost all it is.

Will has done most of the cooking since Max was born, but granola is one nice, easy thing I can make that scratches my cooking itch. I can mix up a batch and throw it in the oven as soon as Max goes to bed, and it makes the house smell good. One batch lasts me about a week and a half.

Here's my basic recipe.

Mix in a big bowl:
3 cups oats
1/4 cup dark or light brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt (I like it relatively salty; you could use less)
1/2 cup almonds

Mix in a Pyrex measuring cup:
1/3 cup olive oil
a few tablespoons honey
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Pour liquid over dry ingredients and mix with hands until thoroughly coated. Press into a rimmed baking sheet. Bake for around 30 minutes, until slightly browned. (Stir partway through if things are looking too uneven.) Let cool on sheet, then remove and toss in any dried fruit (raisins, etc.).

Of course, you can add all kinds of stuff into the granola. Here are some thing I've tried that didn't work:
ground ginger - just didn't do much
cayenne - heat without flavor, didn't work for breakfast
diced dried apricots - meh
an egg - I'd read that adding an egg white would make the granola clump up more, but it just made it tough and not crispy

And here are some that did work:
cinnamon
cardamom
raw almonds
raisins
raw quinoa

The version I've made a few times successfully has cardamom, nutmeg and cinnamon, giving it a sort of chai flavor. I use maybe half a teaspoon of each spice.

Tucson Breakfast of Champions

Anasazi beans, chopped green chile, oregano, cheese, green onions.

Lemon-Chocolate Chip Pancakes

I had an idea this morning. I looked up recipes for chocolate chip pancakes and lemon pancakes and made up this combination of the two.

Lawson put syrup on his, but I think all they need is plain yogurt. Sliced bananas would also be good.

Bowl 1:
1 1/2 c self-rising flour (or all purpose flour + 1 t salt and 1 T baking powder)
2 T sugar
zest of one lemon

Bowl 2:
3 T melted butter
1 egg
1 cup milk
1 t or more lemon juice

Mix well separately, then briefly together.

Sprinkle 4-10 semisweet or bittersweet chocolate chips on each pancake as soon as you pour the batter.

May Breakfast

Berries have been wonderful this year. We had these yogurt bowls for breakfast last week. There's a layer of bananas underneath.

A Breakfast Quandary

For the next several months I'm on an assignment in a different building than usual,and they're having a holiday breakfast next week. I'm the last person to sign up. Here are the other items on the list:

• Egg casserole
• Egg casserole (yes, TWO egg casseroles. I look forward to finding out what egg casserole is.)
• Waffle batter and waffle maker
• Fruit and whipped cream for waffles
• Grits
• Scones and biscotti
• Surprise

I feel like bacon and cantaloupe would round out that menu best, but it's not melon season, and bacon doesn't travel well. Ideas?

Blueberry Buttermilk Whole Wheat Pancakes

I don't make pancakes very often, because come on -- who needs a massive dose of carbohydrates and nothing else first thing in the morning? (Well, Lawson the cereal eater apparently does, but that at least involves milk, too.) When I do have breakfast, it usually involves eggs. But I have a quart of buttermilk that I'm having a rough time finishing up, so I made these pancakes this weekend.

Following some ideas in the Joy of Cooking, I used a standard buttermilk pancake recipe, using whole wheat flour instead of white, and added blueberries and a whole tablespoonful of lemon zest.

Really, really good.

Two Holiday Breakfasts

All these holiday food posts are just now trickling in as I sort through photos and return to normal life. Here are two breakfasts I wish I could eat every week, but instead end up eating about once a year.

On Christmas we intended to have huevos rancheros, but we never got around to making salsa, so we had French toast instead. I used the rest of the Italian bread I'd made for Christmas Eve dinner with Lawson's family. The recipe was pretty standard -- just milk, eggs, vanilla, and a little sugar, sauteed in butter -- but since the bread was so substantial I was able to soak it for a while -- about half an hour to get it really full of flavor.

Unlike pancakes, which I like with yogurt, jam, peanut butter, and various combinations thereof, French toast requires syrup and butter. So maybe it's good I don't eat it too often.

We had huevos rancheros the day after Christmas. Lawson made the salsa, which was pretty impressive for containing winter grocery store tomatoes. I believe he used cherry tomatoes, black beans, lime juice, cilantro, a can of Herdez salsa verde, an an onion. The Anasazi beans cooked on low for almost two days in the crockpot, so they were outstanding. I fried the tortillas and the eggs in olive oil.

Pancakes

I made buckwheat pancakes on Sunday morning. Lawson and I so seldom eat breakfast together (we both rush to get to work on time, I don't often get hungry before lunchtime, and he has a cereal habit) that it all seemed particularly special. The preparation was nothing fancy: I used the Joy of Cooking recipe for basic pancakes, but substituted toasted soba flour for half of the all-purpose flour. Because soba flour doesn't contain gluten, the pancakes were super tender. The nutty, weird buckwheat flavor went really well with the sourness and sweetness of yogurt and preserved figs. Lawson ate his with butter and syrup and seemed equally happy, so whatever.

I'll certainly make buckwheat pancakes again -- homemade soba noodles were fun, but perfecting them would be hilariously complicated, and I have to use up this soba flour somehow. But my favorite, favorite pancakes are sourdough. I'll have to get to work on a sourdough post. Cooking Habit doesn't really lend itself to long academic treatments of the sort I feel bread and yeast deserve, which is why I seldom post about bread here. But autumn means I can pull my starter from the fridge without the jar exploding within 30 hot, humid minutes, so I'll get to testing and writing.

Breakfast of Champions

Here's my favorite breakfast, made by Lawson: Grits with Tomato Gravy. The gravy contains bacon, onions, and tomatoes. Lawson uses coarse grits, and accompanies each serving with a fried egg.

Cantaloupe for Breakfast

It's hard to write about cooking during July because the foods I love most right now require no preparation.

I'm not from the school that puts sugar on grapefruit, cream on blueberries, cheese on apples, etc. It isn't out of purity or health nuttery; it's more like fresh fruit gives me a clean-mouthed feeling that's spoiled by dairy or sucrose.

Lawson grew this cantaloupe, because I am the luckiest eater ever.

Another Breakfast

Because I am actually hungry in the mornings since I quit smoking four months ago, I am now obsessed with breakfast. This is homemade apple cinnamon oatmeal. The apples are raw, which I much prefer to the sticky sweet mushiness of cooked apples. The cinnamon is minimal -- it's SO easy to overpower a dish with cinnamon. And the oats are toasted oats, maybe steel-cut, definitely slow-cooking, from that local mill I ramble on about all the time. (Can I mention for the eightieth time that my friend works there? My friend works there.)

Hangover Breakfast

The day after Lawson and I threw a party at which we drank a lot of beer, we ate this restorative breakfast.

The omelet contained cheese and chives. And bacon is sometimes extremely necessary.

The Recipe Proselytizer

Writing this blog has helped me with a personal problem: I’m a hopeless recipe-pusher, insisting that people try things and blabbing about the wonderfulness of various foods and recipes. Right now it’s collard love, a condition I caught from you, sort of like cooties. I’m bringing the side dishes to dinner at Grandma’s tonight, and I am pressing collards upon her. The menu will be beef stew and homemade bread by Grandma, and collard greens and lemon meringue pie by me.

We had turkey broth-based minestrone for dinner last night. We had a late Italian lunch, so that’s all we needed. At lunch I split two dishes with Juliana—stuffed eggplant (grilled, not fried) and a shrimp scampi salad, and Dad had mixed grilled things over polenta. Red wine. Delicious, and we didn’t get much else done that day.

I made one of our favorite breakfasts this morning, Tomato Cheese Toasts, which I think I invented. First, toast a slice of bread; spread with mustard; add a slice of mild cheese, then a tomato slice or two with salt and pepper; and top with sharp cheese, like bleu or parmesan. Broil for five minutes or so, until browned and bubbly. I have a picture here, but it’s not as beautiful as it tastes.