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Granola – The Recipe

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Since becoming Gluten Free, I have tried a number of Granola recipes, as the bought varieties are often very sweet and expensive! It has taken a while, a bit of testing and advice from friends, relatives and most importantly the kids but we think this is the one! It is crunchy, not too sweet and contains a great mix of nutritious nuts and grains. Add dried fruit if you like or just use up some of your store cupboard ingredients. My new addition…. taken from the Granola recipe in the ‘I quit Sugar’ book is coconut shavings. For me, dried fruit is out but the coconut adds that extra texture and sweetness i was looking for. The kids love em. My three year old daughter can even make this Granola, she eats the leftover mixture from the bowl just like you would a cake!

 

 

We eat ours with a big dollop of Greek Yogurt on the top for breakfast. The kids snack on it as an alternative to biscuits or sprinkle it on a bowl of yogurt as an after dinner pudding treat. Try it and tell me how your family eat theirs!

 

I have given measurements in cups for the dry ingredients as this is how i have always made it but if you plan to use your scales. The general conversion is; for dry ingredients.

 1 cup = 150 – 200g.

 There is no need to be exact when making this Granola. I often just pour in Whatever i have in the cupboard, a handful here, a handful there! Just go with it, experiment to find your perfect mix!

 

Ingredients

Dry

  • 2 cups rolled oats. (we use the washed gluten free variety). If you are not able to eat these try using quinoa flakes)
  • 1/4 cup whole raw almonds & cashew nuts (or any nuts you like)
  • 3/4 cup raw buckwheat
  • 3/4 cup sunflower & pumpkin seeds
  • 1 cup coconut flakes

Wet

  • 80g Coconut oil
  • 3 tablespoon honey or Rice Malt Syrup (this is an alternative to honey that i  use as i am off the sugar, more about that later!)
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 1/2 tsp Cinnamon
  • 1 tsp Vanilla Essence

 

Method

  • Preheat oven to 120 c. Cooking time 40 mins.
  • Line baking tray with baking paper
  • Combine all dry ingredients in bowl, except coconut flakes
  • Melt Coconut oil (either in microwave for a few seconds or on hob).
  • Mix in rest of wet ingredients
  • Combine with dry ingredients
  • Spread evenly on baking tray
  • Cook for 20 mins
  • Mix and turn. Add coconut flakes.
  • Cook for further 20 mins.
  • I like mine crunchy so sometimes cook for a further 5 – 10 mins!
  • Leave to cool. The Granola should be nicely browned, crunchy and ready to eat!
  • Store in airtight container. I use a glass jar. Am guessing it would keep for a few weeks…. Can’t be sure as ours has NEVER lasted that long!

Enjoy x

 

 

This Is How We Roll…..

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Snippets of Summer

This is how we roll….

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Nice Pear!

 

 

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It wasn’t all sunshine…. there were definitely showers too.

 

 

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Guess who?

 

 

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Camping Trip….. early morning walk on the beach.

 

The Box Train

All aboard the Box Train

 

 

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No way back…..

 

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 The day after the night before!

 

We had lots of fun this summer. Felt privileged to live by the coast. Time to embrace Autumn. Lovin being in the kitchen… cooking up a storm!!

Coeliac Disease – The Way We Eat Now

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We Way We Eat Now…..

 

Making the most of what you have is the philosophy I try to follow. The old adage is true, you come out of the tough times stronger and wiser so I try to make sure I take away something positive from situations and experiences that are upsetting or testing. Easier said than done sometimes. The most recent thing we have faced is the identification of Coeliac Disease running in the family.  This is a condition where the body cannot tolerate gluten and is lifelong, with the only treatment being exclusion of Gluten from diet. The symptoms are varied and range from bloating, severe tummy pain, sickness, fatigue, joint ache and weight loss but there are many others. The condition is actually fairly common but diagnosis can be difficult and take many years.

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Excluding Gluten from the diet is not easy as it is present in most grains and cereals and a hidden ingredient in many processed foods. The western diet is heavily focused on bread, cereal, pasta etc, and this was the case in our house. As I ran through the average days meals in my head I was panicked by the fact that nearly every one contained gluten in some form. The task that lay ahead seemed huge and slightly overwhelming but not one to be put off by a challenge I set about overhauling our diet.

 I went a little crazy and over the top at first…… having read all the information I could lay my hands on… I threw out all flour, bread, breakfast cereals containing wheat, barley etc, soya sauce, fish fingers, sausages, the toaster…. The list is endless. Then I cleaned the cupboards, bought new chopping boards and ran the pans through a hot cycle in the dishwasher. Exhausted, I realised I needed to restock but with what!!! Arghhhhh.

So it’s ok for me to go ‘Gluten Free’, I eat salad, pulses, grains and vegetables but for my 6 year old son it was not going to be so easy. I fight to get any fruit past his lips and his vegetable consumption consists of broccoli, carrots and corn on the cob. First loves are pizza, spaghetti bolognaise, apple crumble and he is more than partial to a slice of cake! I was going to have to be clever, inventive and become a good cook!

This was nearly a year ago. We have come a long way. But hey, I am a busy Mum with 3 kids and want to enjoy life. I don’t have time to soak pulses, prepare meals that take 3 hours and my kids are still relatively fussy. I like to keep meals simple, fun and tasty. My confidence in cooking Gluten free meals, cakes, deserts and snacks has grown but eating out can be a challenge, particularly for my son. Birthday parties, going to tea at friends’ houses, holidays etc.  I now have strategies to make these situations as hassle free as possible and more importantly ensure that my son has fun, does not feel different or excluded and eats yummy food. Educating him about Coeliac Disease has been important so he can make gluten free choices for himself!

Me, My Family & Food

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So, why start a blog when I already have a lot on my plate? Well, food has become a bigger focus in our house over the last year with my son being diagnosed with Coeliac Disease (more about that in my next post). Having managed to overhaul our diet and remove all gluten containing products I realized that I had substituted with many sugar-laden foods! My skin and my sons was not good, I felt sluggish and often irritable. We were all eating a lot of fruit, dried fruit, homemade cake and biscuits etc. Good right?! Well actually not. Even these high levels of ‘natural’ sugars were having an adverse effect on our bodies but I was not aware of this until I chanced upon a book – Whilst visiting one of my oldest and dearest friends in Australia I picked up a book, which was lying around their house. Written, in fact, by her fiancés sister. ‘I quit Sugar (by Sarah Wilson).  http://www.iquitsugar.com Two pages in and I was gripped.

 

“Our modern food system is set up around sugar, and seductively so. A muesli bar can contain more sugar than a block of chocolate; everyday bbq sauce more than chocolate topping. You try to do the right thing only to find low-fat yogurt contains more sugar than ice cream. You feed your kids ‘wholegrain’ cereal in the morning with some juice and pack their lunchbox with ‘healthy’ snacks, like raisins or fruit. By lunch they’ve eaten their way through a Mars-bar-and-cola-can worth of sugar” Sarah Wilson.

 

Note: It is not ‘sugar’ per se that is the problem. It is the fructose element (which our bodies store as fat), the glucose part is broken down and utilized as energy. Many fruits and dried fruits contact high levels of Fructose. This is where I was confused. I thought that all the sugars in fruit were ‘good sugars’. I was wrong and had been gorging on fruit ever since we became ‘gluten free’. It was a readily available snack! – more on the biology later!

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In the last 6 weeks I have eliminated sugar from my diet, learned more about hidden sugars in the food we eat and started to look at my children’s diet. I was shocked at the amount of sugar they actually consume and have been pulling together recipes, snacks and ideas to reduce their sugar consumption; Using my kids as guinea pigs!!! All the recipes are gluten free, and mostly completely sugar free – I have taken inspiration from a number of sources then simplified the recipes to cater for the tastes of little ones and in order to make them quick and easy to prepare. Will quote original sources and provide links where necessary.

 

Anyone who wants to follow my journey read on; I am interested in the ‘biology bit’, the tasty food bit and the way society and the food industry has developed in recent years so that we accept, all be it unwittingly, sugar laden foods to be sold to us!

 

I am not here to get fanatical, be virtuous or preach at you. My experience will, I hope, enable families coping with autoimmune diseases such as Coeliac’s find cooking and meals enjoyable again as well as those who want to reduce the amount of sugar (especially hidden sugars) in their diet and those of their kids do it more easily. BTW, I don’t spend hours in the kitchen. All my meals contain as few ingredients as possible, do not use expensive and difficult to find substitutes and are quick to prepare. I am busy right!

 

Lets get going……..