Blueberry Vanilla Granola
I’ve been a fan of granola for as long as I can remember. When I was a kid, my family would take a yearly trip to San Diego and while there, we would go to the famous weekend breakfast buffet in The Crown Room at The Hotel Del Coronado.
The spread was amazing! Waffles, bacon, eggs, sausage, seafood, omelet station, tons of fruit, cereal and pastries to name just a few items. All that wonderful food and I would always go for a bowl of granola. An 8 year old kid with all the waffles and bacon I could eat, and I just wanted granola…with raisins at that. I’ve always been an old soul, and I have the palate to prove it.
To this day, if there’s granola on a menu, you bet I’m ordering it!
As for my favorite granola to eat at home, my homemade blueberry vanilla granola does the trick.
Ingredients:
- 3 cups rolled oats
- 1 1/2 cups sliced almonds
- 1 cup shredded sweetened coconut
- 1 heaping teaspoon cinnamon
- 5 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 1/3 cup honey
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- 1 cup dried blueberries
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350F
In a large bowl, mix the oats, almonds, coconut and cinnamon together.
In a small saucepan, heat the butter, honey and salt over medium-low heat until it just begins to bubble, remove from the heat and add the vanilla.
Pour the butter honey mixture over the oat mixture and stir until the oat mixture is evenly coated.
Pour onto a 13x18x1-inch sheet pan and bake for about 25-30 minutes, stirring every 5 minutes until it turns an even golden color.
Don’t leave this alone, it can go from perfectly golden to burnt in a matter of minutes.
Remove granola from the oven and cool on the pan, stirring every so often. (It will continue to crisp up as it cools.) Stir in the dried blueberries and store your cooled granola in an airtight container.
Enjoy with ice cold milk, on top of yogurt with a drizzle of honey or just by the handful as an afternoon snack.
