Hazelnut and Cocoa Nib Granola

One of my favorite granola is made by the Seattle-based Marge Bakery and it features oats, filberts and coconut baked at low temperatures and tossed with cacao nibs. It goes extremely well with strawberries and almond milk and I love the slightly warm hint of cardamom in the background. Unfortunately, the granola also costs an insane amount for reasons I'm not particularly sure of. I think it averages out to almost a dollar an ounce!

I've attempted to recreate this in my own kitchen, and I'm rather happy to report that it's quite a passable replication. One of the irritating things about store-bought granola is the meager amounts of the 'good stuff' that gets included i.e. nuts, berries and seeds are often overwhelmed by brown sugar and cheap oats. With homemade granola, you can always add or subtract things that you like, so feel free to add dried blueberries or cranberries or substitute the nuts to turn this into your own personalized granola. The granola is baked at very low heat so it turns out crispy.

My recipe here differs slightly from Marge Bakery's in that I'm using slightly more nuts and cardamom. Marge Bakery also uses only maple syrup, but I love the flavor of Ballard Bee's local raw honey which, when coupled with a small amount of vanilla powder, lends a mellowly sweet, floral undertone to the granola. It must be said here that vanilla powder is one of those things that when you start using, you'll never want to give up. I use it in lieu of vanilla extract in all my baked goods now, and it looks and tastes so much better than its alcohol-infused counterpart.

With the exception of the Oregon filberts (just substitute regular hazelnuts), most of the ingredients used here is available online through Amazon.com or your local health store. I recommend using organic ingredients when you can find them just because that's what I personally use, but conventional grown works just fine. 

Hazelnut and Cacao Nib Granola (inspired by Marge Bakery)
Makes 12oz

2 cups organic rolled oats
1/4 cup chopped raw Oregon filberts
1/4 cup chopped raw walnuts
1/4 cup white sesame seeds
1/4 cup organic unsweetened coconut flakes
1/4 cup organic maple syrup, Grade B
1/4 cup local honey
1/4 cup cold-pressed olive oil (or grapeseed oil)
1/8 teaspoon cardamom
1/8 teaspoon vanilla powder (or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract)
1/8 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 cup raw cacao nibs

Preheat oven to 250°F. Mix all ingredients except cacao nibs in a large bowl, stir to combine. Spread in a single layer on a sheet pan lined with parchment paper. Bake for 15 minutes at 250°F. Flip granola, bake for another 15 minutes. 

Remove from oven, let cool, then mix in cacao nibs. Store in airtight jars for up to two weeks.

Homemade Almond Milk

Mud Australia cup & saucer, Burleigh Alden cereal bowl, Mepra Linea Oro spoon, vintage bowl, Weck juice jar, Simon Pearce Woodbury creamer

My desire for homemade almond milk stems from two things: 1) Making lattes for a husband who is deathly allergic to dairy and 2) Store-bought, pre-packaged almond milk often tastes like gummy water. Ever since I bought a Vitamix, I've found it really easy to make fresh batches of almond milk every week. I like it so much, I've started to substitute it for milk in my morning cereal and hot chocolate. 

I use raw, unpasteurized almonds from Massa Organics (a small rice farm in Northern California) because I also buy their brown rice and order bulk almonds from them out of convenience. By law, "raw almonds" from California sold in stores have to be steam pasteurized. I'm not entirely convinced that pasteurization kills all the nutrients in almonds but this site certainly seems to think so. Europeans do not pasteurize their almonds, so I can't imagine why we need to, other than some random salmonella outbreak a few years ago. Anyway, use whatever unroasted, unsalted, whole almonds you can find. I have to point out, however, that the almonds from Massa Organics are  one of the best I've ever tasted and for some reason, produces silky, thick almond milk. Please support them if you can.

Soaking the almonds overnight helps break down the enzymes in the skin and make it easier to digest - sort of the same reason why many people advocate sprouting grains and seeds. I add dates as a sweetener and some coconut butter for flavor, but you can also use any kind of sweetener you want, though adding white sugar negates the health benefits I guess. I would recommend maple syrup or coconut nectar as other options. The recipe I use yields a very mellow, slightly sweet almond milk with a thick, creamy consistency almost like whole milk but you can add an extra cup of water to thin it out. I've own a few different blenders before and while they all work fine for making nut milk, the Vitamix is powerful enough to pulverize the nuts finely, yielding more of the final product. 

Homemade Almond Milk

Makes about 1.5 quarts or 1.5L

2 cups raw almonds, soaked overnight (or at least 12 hours)

6 cups (48oz.) of filtered water 

4 organic Medjool dates, pitted

1 tablespoon coconut butter (optional)

1/2 teaspoon vanilla powder (or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract)

Pinch of sea salt

Blend all ingredients together at high speed until the mixture reaches a thick, foamy consistency. Strain through nut bag and store for up to a week in glass containers. 

The left over pulverized almonds can be used to make almond meal (chuck it in the oven at the lowest setting for 24 hours, grind finely and store in refrigerator). I also use them in making my pear and ginger tart.