Some food, some drink.
The Golden Ratio of Granola
Abstract: If you glean nothing more from this post (and you adore granola like I do), know that great fabulous granola can be had with:
- A digital scale
- 4 parts rolled oats
- 1 part liquid sugar
- 1 part dry (granular) sugar
- 1 part fat
- 2 parts pre-bake mix-ins (like nuts and grains)
- 2 part post-bake mix-ins (like dried fruit & chocolate)
ALL MEASURED BY WEIGHT!
Purpose: A
few months ago, I read Michael
Ruhlman's book Ratio cover-to
cover. I never read a cookbook cover-to cover, much less start from
the beginning; but that slick illustration on the front cover had me
wanting for a complete understanding. Truth is, I discovered I've
been cooking this way for quite awhile & just never had the
method put on rails for me. We right-brainers gotta do it and
see it, otherwise we're pretty
worthless at following instructions.
Armed
with my trusty digital scale (seriously, y'all have
a digital scale, right?), I threw together a batch of granola
and reviewed my notes (Take notes people! How you gonna learn?).
Upon observation, I noticed I was darn near some equivalency in
proportions; i.e.- a ratio. So yeah; why not a granola ratio as
well? Granola is infinitely variable & everyone's got their own
favorite ingredients. Don't like coconut? Try some flax seed (hell,
try both). Fruit? Chocolate? Whatever. As long as you stick close to
the proportions & take the time to measure, it's hard to mess
up. The recipe I'm listing is the way I happened to make last time (it turned out so well, it became my go-to gift at Christmas!).
Please do modify
and let me know what you come up with.
Recipe: Jump to the detailed recipe. (or, keep reading for the gist of it) -
Base
Pre-bake mix-ins (6 oz total)
Post-bake mix-ins (6 oz total)
Preheat oven to 300F.
Dump honey, sugar, salt, allspice & cinnamon into a saucepan
& stir on medium heat until sugar is mostly dissolved. Add oil & slowly whisk together
until (mostly) combined (Be careful! this stuff is HOT).
Pour into oats & pre-bake mix.
Spread evenly onto a parchment(or silpat)-lined 1/2 sheet pan. Bake 45 mins, stirring every 15 mins.
When nicely brown & nutty smelling, remove pan from oven, stir in post-bake stuff, press into pan & let
cool on sheet pan. When cool, store in something airtight for up to a week, or freeze if storing longer.
Observation: In one
iteration, I went with demerara sugar because I wanted that raw
sugar flavor. It was a real pain the the ass to get it to dissolve
completely, hence the plain white sugar this time around. That said,
I might use a cone of panela
next time.
On another note, you don't wanna rush this stuff in the
oven. A lot of what you're working with has pretty low smoke points.
Burnt granola is still better than no granola, but we're talking
about shaving off 15-20 minutes tops here. I mention this because I
learned it the hard way. My burnt granola came courtesy of cast iron
on a gas grill, where temperature is a bit harder to control.
Results: It took me a couple of attempts to get this recipe down, but since them I've done a few different iterations. Try a coconut pre-bake mix-in with a tropical mixed fruit post-bake mix-in. Or, go trail mix with peanuts on the pre-bake, finishing with raisins & m&m's on the post-bake end. I've been meaning to do butter pecan; someone try that & let me know how it works!
Gallery:
When the sugar and spice looks like this, it's time to whisk in the fat. Do be careful. Boiling sugar and hot oil aren't known for their therapeutic properties on the skin.
Wall-to-wall granola. The first time I made this, I dehydrated my own apples. My dehydrator can't keep up with my granola habit, so I buy 'em now.
Variation on a theme: Found a bag of tropical-style dried fruit so I ran with that. In some creative fat and sugar swappery, the grains have been dosed with demerara sugar, honey, olive oil and coconut cream.
Apple Cinnamon and Spice Granola, freshly de-panned. This bowl was nowhere to be found the next day.
