Garlic Girl’s Clumpy Peanut Butter Granola

I’ve been making homemade granola for quite some time, and while I think it’s really yummy, I’ve never quite been able to make it clumpy when I’m in a clumpy granola sort of mood. Until now…
In browsing various recipes in the last several months, I did find recipes that claimed to create clumpy granola, but I never found the results I was looking for. I was actually shooting for a kind of broken up granola bar, but not quite. In any case, after experimenting recently, I finally came up with a recipe that is both delicious and clumpy! I made some for my brother Darien for his birthday, but he still likes my original recipe better. I like it the original too, but I think I like this one just a wee bit more. So if you’re in a clumpy granola kind of mood, you might want to give this one a go. I’m always so thrilled with how simple it is to make, how healthy it is, and how wonderful it makes your home smell!

Garlic Girl’s Clumpy and Nutty Peanut Butter Granola

Preheat oven to 275 degrees

Ingredients
3 1/2 – 4  cups old fashioned rolled oats
1/2  cup slivered almonds (not sliced, you want them chunkier) I get mine at Trader Joe’s
1/2 cup cashews, roughly chopped
1/8 cup golden flax seeds
2 tbls almond meal
1/4 cup sunflower seeds (hulled and raw)
1/2 cup raisins (or your choice of dried fruit)
1/4 cup peanut butter, I used Valencia Peanut Butter with Roast Flaxseeds from Trader Joe’s (no, I don’t work for TJ’s, I just love some of their products).
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup grade b pure maple syrup (add more if you like it sweeter)
2 tbls brown sugar
1/2 cup water
2 tsps vanilla extract
2 tbls cinnamon (of course you can use less, I just prefer more)
pinch of salt

Preparation

– Combine all dry ingredients (minus the raisins and brown sugar) in a large mixing bowl
– Combine all wet ingredients plus the brown sugar in a small sauce pan and stir occasionally until simmering. Simmer for a few minutes until it starts to emulsify and thicken.
– Pour hot mixture slowly over oat mixture and stir until the mixture is moist and the liquid is evenly distributed throughout.
– Spread mixture evenly onto heavy cookie sheet and place on middle rack in heated oven.
Note: the secret to good granola is to cook slow and low! Granola is not done is 12 minutes despite you read around the blogosphere.
– After 20 minutes, take out and turn the mixture, making sure to push the granola from the edges inward toward the middle.
– Place back in oven for another 10 minutes. Now for the clumpy trick…
– With a flat spatula or tool firmly press the granola down so that it looks like one large granola bar. If you don’t want clumply granola, just turn again like you did the first time.
– Now put back in the oven for the last 10 minutes. Total baking time is 40 minutes!
– Remove from the oven and place a clean, heavy pan on top of the granola while it’s cooling. I use a cooking stone that heavy. If it’s smaller than the pan, you can simply move it to different sections every several minutes until cool.
– Now you can break apart, add to a large bowl and add the raisins or any other dried fruit.
– Keep in air tight container.

Serving suggestion:
So great with greek yogurt and fruit, on it’s own as a snack, or in a bowl of cereal with your favorite milk!