Easy Granola Recipe - Culinary Ginger (2024)

FAQs

What is granola made of? ›

Granola is usually considered a healthy breakfast cereal. It's a toasted mixture of rolled oats, nuts, and a sweetener like sugar or honey, though it can also include other grains, puffed rice, dried fruit, seeds, spices, and nut butters.

Bake low and slow.

Cook at 300 degrees F slowly for about 30 minutes or until it is golden brown and toasty. Cooking at too high of a temperature will likely burn the honey coating, the oats, and the nuts. A lower temperature ensures even baking for crispy, crunchy granola.

Add an egg white.

The whites act as a kind of glue that binds the ingredients together. To ensure that the egg whites coat all the ingredients, I beat them with a whisk until foamy and increased in volume, which makes it much easier to fold into the granola.

On the downside, granola can be high in added sugars, hidden calories, and saturated fat, making some options less healthy.

Granola is also calorie dense – some contain a little more than 300 calories per cup, but others can pack up to 600 calories per cup, from added oils, coconut, chocolate and added sugars including evaporated cane juice, honey, maple syrup, molasses, cane sugar and brown rice syrup.

Whether it's homemade or store-bought, properly storing granola will help extend the shelf life and maintain crunchiness. Store granola in an airtight container or tightly sealed zip-top bag in a dry, dark place away from heat.

Chia seeds are often praised for their binding powers. In fact, they secure ingredients so well that they can even be used as an egg replacer. Adding just a spoonful of chia seeds to your favorite granola bar recipe will make a huge difference in its texture.

YUM! More reasons to obsess over homemade granola: Healthier: it has less sugar and is lower Calorie than anything you'll find at the store. Freezer Friendly: It will keep for months in the freezer, stored in a freezer safe bag.

Once you try homemade granola, you won't go back to store-bought granola. It's so much better! This granola recipe is also a far more healthy granola option, since it's made with whole grains, unrefined oil and naturally sweetened.

Clumpy Granola Method: Add Egg White

The egg white is whisked until frothy (20 to 30 seconds will do it), then stirred into the oat mixture. The idea is that the egg's protein will help the oats bind to each other and create delicate clusters.

Should you stir granola while baking? ›

First, press the granola into an even layer before you put it in the oven. Then, stir it only once halfway through cooking. For really good clumps, press down on the finished granola before it cools and avoid jostling it on the pan until cooled completely.

Kellogg's® Granola Crunchy. Indulge with the delicious Kellogg's® Granola Crunchy. It is the perfect combination of rolled oat clusters with shredded coconut and a hint of cinnamon.

Homemade granola bars are best when stored in the fridge or cooler areas of your kitchen (like a dark pantry). I keep mine in the fridge. Remember that the sticky glue holding these together is made with butter, which has a low melting point. So once these bars warm up, they fall apart more easily.

Make sure that whichever granola recipe you use, it calls for some liquid, typically oil of some kind (I recommend olive oil for a subtle earthy, floral flavor, or melted unrefined coconut oil for subtly coconutty flavor). The liquid will help the chia seeds to gel, ensuring the granola sticks together.

The Bottom Line. Granola is healthy in small amounts, especially because oats, nuts, seeds and dried fruit in granola provide some fiber that's good for heart and gut health. However, granola can also be a rich source of calories, saturated fat and sugar, depending on the brand you buy.

The primary difference between oatmeal and granola is that oatmeal is made from whole oat grains that have been cooked at a higher temperature than usual to gelatinize the starch. Granola contains rolled oats, fruits, honey, raisins, almonds, and other components.

Which One Is Better for Breakfast? Both oatmeal and granola make for a healthy, nutritious breakfast, but the winner for us is granola—the added nuts, seeds, and dried fruits give you a source of fiber and healthy fats that oatmeal can't quite compete with.

“For active people, granola is best known for being a source of carbohydrate to fuel the muscles and provide energy for a busy day,” Clark says.