Ok, I’m back to breakfast for today! One of the things my family loves to eat for breakfast is granola. It’s a comparable sensory-experience to cereal (some people just need that crunch and cold milk in the morning… meaning: my hubby! 🙂 ), but of course far far outweighs the nutritional value of any boxed cereal, no matter how “natural” the label says it is. It is also much more filling than toast, or other simple carb breakfast, or even plain oatmeal.
Here is my granola recipe, once again a blend of different recipes I have made over the years. My Little M and I both do well with Bob’s Red Mill Gluten-Free Oats, so that is what I use.
Spring’s Granola Recipe
- 4 c. GF rolled oats
- 1 c. crushed almonds (I do them in my food processor)
- 1/2 c. sorghum or other GF flour
- 1 tsp. cinnamon
- 1/4 c. shredded coconut
- 1 c. sunflower seeds (we prefer these run through the food processor too)
- 1/2 c. ground flax (or a whole grain bran of some type, if you are not GF)
- 1 c. honey or molasses
I grind the almonds and sunflower seeds (one cup at a time) in my food processor, not until they are a flour, but until they are well broken up, like into a “meal”. I put all the dry ingredients into my kitchen-aid bowl, and mix, then add the honey. (I often mix the honey in a little more by hand, while putting into onto the baking sheet.) I lightly oil my baking sheet with light olive oil, and then spread the granola evenly on the pan. I bake at 250 for 20 minutes, stir, and then do another 15-20 minutes in the oven, depending on how chewy vs crunchy you like your oatmeal. We prefer ours on the chewy side. Cool, and then store in an air-tight container.
Because not everyone hear love raisins, we add them separately to our bowls, but you could add them when putting the granola into your container. I sometimes add in vanilla when mixing, and sometimes I’ve added pumpkin seeds.
Milk Alternatives
We have been using rice milk for YEARS in our family, long before we went gluten-free. (Incidentally, after removing gluten, corn and soy from my diet, my intolerance to dairy just about disappeared! Two of my family are still highly intolerant however at this point). Our favorite rice milk is Rice Dream.
I use the “classic” one, which has no “enriched” items in it, like added vitamins, as these vitamins are almost always in a corn-solution-carrier, and I am allergic to corn. Rice milk gets expensive for five people though! Sometimes I’ll buy this milk for myself, and then the Rice Dream refrigerator milks (that are enriched) for the rest of the family, to save money. I have also made my own rice milk this summer, which I have used successfully in smoothies, but have not yet passed off as “normal milk” with granola or oatmeal to the kids. 🙂
- 1/2 c. cooked rice
- 2 c. filtered water
- 2 dates
I put these ingredients into my Vitamix, and pulverize it for about 2-3 minutes. Then I pour it through a fine strainer into my measuring cup.
Then I pour it into a glass bottle or jar and keep in the fridge. It does separate some, but so does the store-bought stuff, just a little more so.
I have also made almond milk, use a few tbs of almonds for 1 cup of filtered water, and used this in baking and smoothies, as well. That might be my favorite! 🙂 When we cook up a batch of rice for a meal, I will put half-cup portions into freezer bags, and freeze them. Then, when I need rice milk, I can pull out one bag, and have the right amount of rice.
One more breakfast recipe for Day 10: Breakfast Cookies!!
Tired of breakfast yet? 🙂
This is part of a 31 Days series on Less Stress in Allergy-Free Eating. To view a list of all the posts in the series you can go here. To subscribe to my posts via email, you can go to my homepage, and type in your email address in the box on the right-hand margin. To view the list of over 700 bloggers participating in this 31 Days blogging challenge go here!
