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In May I went to BlogHer Food ’11 – it was a last minute trip made possible by my dear friend Jes, who works for BlogHer and my supportive husband who may or may not have had selfish motives by prompting me to learn more about food and cooking.

In an effort to be as economical as possible, I opted to have a roommate so I could split the cost of lodging.

I may or may not have had ulterior motives to make friends with some one besides Jes so I didn’t have to follow her like a pesky shadow when my introvert tendencies overwhelmed my extrovert nature.

Whew.

Carol, was nice enough to offer to share her two bed room at the Westin, so it was settled.  I decided to make treats to accompany my trip to Atlanta, because who shows up to a food conference without food? However my normal go-to party treats were not gonna fly – Carol is a healthy eater, according to her most recent blog post. Her post reminded me of homemade granola I made years ago with my dear friend Regina. I didn’t have the recipe so I went in search of one and came across Kelli’s (of African Kelli) Nutty Spring Granola and it won me over.

Ingredients:

8 cups rolled oats
3 cups of extras: I used flaked coconut, pumpkin seeds, pistachios, slivered almonds, Craisins, dried blueberries, dried cherries, sunflower seeds, walnuts,
1 cup (or more!) of peanut butter. I really should have heeded Kelli’s advice and added MORE peanut butter, I fear I was too conservative!
1/2 cup molasses
1/2 cup honey
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1/4 teaspoon of salt

Directions:

Spread oats out on a large jelly roll pan and toast them at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Be watchful. These will need to come out of the oven after 5 minutes and be stirred or they will burn.

In a saucepan on medium heat, add your molasses, honey, peanut butter, vanilla and almond extracts and salt. Stir this until it is a wonderful gooey consistency. Remove from heat.

Place toasted oats in a large bowl. Add any or all of your extras now. I used two cups of raw coconut, a cup of peanuts and a mixed bag of toasted nuts. Pour the saucepan over your bowl, carefully mixing the ingredients. Return all of this to your jelly roll pan and into the oven for another 20-25 minutes at 350 degrees.

Again, don’t leave the kitchen. This will burn if you don’t regularly mix it.   Side note: I stayed in the kitchen the whole time and one of my batches (I had to spread it over 2 trays because my single tray wasn’t large enough – or so I didn’t think so) did slightly burn.

I guess there is a difference from just physically being in the kitchen and being actively engaged in your cooking while in the kitchen.  Ooops!

Lesson Learned: LISTEN TO KELLI!

Let the granola cool and package as you wish.  I kept the remainder at home in an airtight container for later…

Voila! There is is folks! Trust me – this stuff is AMAZING! I only wish I hadn’t been so frugal and tried to mix bits of my burnt into bits of my non burnt. BAD IDEA.

But we won’t keep focusing on all the WRONG things I did…this was my first time after all! Anyway, I had a cute plastic paint canister with a lid that I decided to package Carol’s granola into. This way it could travel well in my suitcase, and provide an airtight seal for maximum freshness!

Although in hindsight she may not have wanted bits of freshly burnt granola…perhaps stale burnt would have been more subtle?

Pish posh.

I am most definitely going to make this yummy recipe again!

Have you ever made homemade granola?

Any tips for a novice like myself? (Besides “stir frequently?”)