A couple of months ago, Jenny turned us on to Olive Oil Granola. After tasting Jenny’s, Matt became borderline fanatical about it. Then Dana, another Momfilter contributor, started talking about this “amazing granola recipe” that she thought we should write about. This is precisely the kind of mini zeitgeist we live for at Momfilter and can’t help but share. Here are the three versions, all of which are super easy, way cheaper, and way better than anything you can get off the shelf or from a bulk bin–no matter how fancy and organic the store. You can also turn it into a weekend project with kids.
I’ll-Miss-You Granola (from Jenny Rosenstrach of Dinner a Love Story, adapted from Melissa Clark’s Olive Oil Granola, The New York Times)
This might also be called “Thanks-for-having-me” Granola or “Congratulations” Granola or “Just-Because” Granola. Because once you taste the crazy good olive-oil infused concoction — as I did at my friend Melissa‘s house — you will want to make it for everyone you know for every occasion. So far, mason jar after mason jar has been filled with it and given to my dad for Father’s Day, to weekend hosts who let my family crash their home for a backyard camp-out, and for my daughters’ two heaven-sent teachers as end-of-the-year gifts. I gave the girls blank shipping tags (which you can find at any stationery store) so they could tie on a personalized message. Abby chose “I’ll Miss You” and Phoebe chose ”I Love You.” That one works, too.
Ingredients:
3 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
1 1/2 cups raw pistachios, hulled
1 cup raw pumpkin seeds (pepitas), hulled
1 cup coconut chips
3/4 cup pure maple syrup
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom
Special Equipment:
Medium-size mason jars or any old glass jars
Plain shipping tags
Preparation:
Preheat oven to 300°F. In a large bowl, combine oats, pistachios, pumpkin seeds, coconut chips, maple syrup, olive oil, brown sugar, salt, cinnamon and cardamom. Spread mixture on a rimmed baking sheet in an even layer and bake for 45 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes, until golden brown and well toasted. Transfer granola to a large bowl and let cool. Add to jars when completely cool and tie a shipping tag to the top. If there is no notch on the lid as shown above, replace the tag’s string with a long, thin ribbon and tie the tag around the neck of the jar.
If you’re not giving the granola away, serve with yogurt and fresh berries.
Makes about 9 cups.
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Kill Zone Granola (from Matthew Hranek of The William Brown Project)
This is a recipe adapted from my friend Jenny of Dinner a Love Story, that she adapted from the New York Times. Her husband Andy appropriately called it “Kill Zone” and I will call mine the same. Ours was made with whatever was available in the pantry (plus or minus some stuff from the original recipe) and it is killer.
Ingredients:
3 cups old fashioned oats
1 1/4 roasted and hulled pistachios
1/2 cup chopped pecans
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
3/4 cup olive oil (this sets this recipe apart)
1 cup maple syrup
1/2 cup light brown sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
Preparation:
Combine all ingredients
Spread on a cookie sheet (easier cleanup with a Silpat mat)
Bake at 300 degrees for 45 minutes, mixing every 10 minutes until roasted golden
When cool, jar, store, and eat.
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Olive Oil Granola with Dried Apricots and Pistachios (from Dana Gallagher of The Stuff to Remember)
I’ve never been a huge granola fan. It’s a bit like a cardboard snack to me but I’ve been making my own from this recipe in the Times (by the lovely Melissa Clark) and it’s great. Store bought granola never has all the things I like so making your own makes sense. Plus, this one is made with olive oil and who knew it was so easy to make- not that I ever really thought about it!
Ingredients:
3 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
1 1/2 cups raw pistachios, hulled
1 cup raw pumpkin seeds hulled
1 cup coconut chips
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
3/4 cup pure maple syrup
1/2 cup packed lt brown sugar
1 tsp kosher salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp cardamom
3/4 cup chopped dried apricots
Preparation:
Preheat oven to 300 degrees. In a large bowl combine oats, pistachios, pumpkin seeds, coconuts chips, maple syrup, olive oil, brown sugar, salt, cinnamon and cardamom. Spread mixture on a baking sheet in an even layer and bake for 45 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes, until golden brown and well toasted.
Transfer granola to a large bowl and add apricots, tossing to combine. I put dried cranberries in mine as well so it has a bit of a bite. I also love the big bits of dried coconut so I sometimes put a bit more of that in too. It’s a good thing to let your kids help with because there’s minimal cooking involved, mostly measuring and stirring which is sort of stress free kitchen labor. And frankly, if your measurements are off, who gives a hoot!
Serve with fresh ricotta or a nice greek yogurt or just put some in a snack bowl if your kids are peckish…
On a recession note, the ingredients do add up, especially the raw pistachios. You can find them at Trader Joe’s (a great source for inexpensive nuts and dried fruits) but they’re salted and roasted. I’ve used them before and really didn’t notice the difference and the price is maybe half that of other commercial grocery stores.
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P.S. If you have a variation or an entirely different granola recipe you think we need to know about, let us know.
I have been making this for years only I use honey and sesame seeds great with greek yogert and strawberrys. Thanks for the ideas.
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i just forwarded this post to all of my friends – most of the same people i would make this for. dumb.
here are some additional ideas that i’ve tried or thought about trying:
- Use less salt, but use coarse salt – that way you have occasional salty bites mixed into a generally sweet granola
- One of my fav recipes uses pecans as the only nuts, but stir in dried blueberries at the end. Sahadi’s in Brooklyn has the best deal on dried blueberries. I’m looking forward to trying this one with Olive oil.
- I always thought savory granolas would be good – now especially with Olive oil. Flavors such as curry-cashew or perhaps red-pepper apricot might work. I haven’t had much luck making a delicious one yet.
- for more fruit flavor and less sweetness one can use many of the middle eastern syrups, especially the 100% fruit ones. I’ve used Grape molasses (100% grape) and cherry molasses (it’s hard to find with 100% cherries – most has corn syrup). Mixing these with honey or maple-syrup allows you to adjust the tartness/sweetness tradeoff
- Finally, one of my best experiments was s’mores granola. I added crushed graham crackers to the original mix of pecans, oats, oil, maple syrup and etc. With about 5 minutes to go in the oven, I stirred in shredded Marshmallows and let them toast and get stuck to the mix. As soon as I removed it from the oven I stirred in dark chocolate morsels.
Thanks for the great granola article! I’ve never thought about using olive oil and look forward to trying.
I don’t use oil….it’s not really necessary and you can make bigger batches that last longer. Just use a sweetener that’s sticky, like honey, or maple syrup. I use hazelnuts, pecans, almonds, coconut, sesame seeds, ground flax, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, salt and rolled oats. Sometimes I add a tablespoon of raw cocoa powder, and always dried fruit, whatever’s on hand, thrown in toward the end of cooking so it doesn’t get too chewy.
Hi Sheila, thanks for your technique. I agree, for big batches, no oil is key. Nothing worse than anything rancid. If you’re up for the small batch though, the olive oil gives it a flavor that I think is amazing.
love this granola recipe!! we are still crazy over granola after a post on nonchalantmom about the same topic! we use honey instead of maple syrup but recipe is much the same… I love it with cantaloupe + greek yogurt! it’s all good… yum!
Hi there,
These recipes look fantastic. How long does a batch made with oil last would you say?
Thanks!
I think probably a couple of weeks but we couldn’t keep it around for more than a couple of days!