Hippie Love Granola

I am so excited to share this recipe with you. I pretty much just took all my favorite grains – lots of oats, quinoa, amaranth, millet, flax, and chia –  threw them into a bowl, and baked up a batch of…well, love. 🙂

This granola is fantastic. So, so fantastic. I’ve been tossing it in with my overnight oats, or just as cereal (I do recommend using almond milk for cereal – the nuttiness really adds a lot). It’s a little on the crumbly side, so it works better as a cereal than as a trail mix.

Note: I read a bunch of tutorials online on how to pop amaranth, but I couldn’t get it to work for me. I included the directions below in case you could get it to work, but this granola works great with the amaranth raw.

Note 2: You may see from the pictures that I forgot the nuts. It is tasty either way. 🙂

Ingredients

• 3 cups rolled oats
• 2/3 cup uncooked millet
• 1/3 cup uncooked amaranth
• 1/4 cup flax seed (I used 2 tbs ground, and 2 tbs whole, for the texture)
• 1/4 oat bran (or other bran)
• 1/2 cup uncooked quinoa, rinsed
• 1/4 chia seeds
• 1/2 cup walnuts (or other nut)
• 1/2 cup almonds (or other nut)
• 2 tsp cinnamon (i LOVE cinnamon. Most people would probably use 1 tsp)
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 1/2 tsp ground ginger
• 1/4 cup pure maple syrup
• 2 tbs canola oil, or  coconut oil
• 1/4 cup applesauce
• 1/4 cup spiced apple cider
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp almond extract

Directions

Preheat oven to 350. First pop the amaranth – heat a frying pan over medium heat, cover, and shake the pan a little until most of the amaranth has popped (like mini popcorn kernels). Then mix all dry ingredients (except nuts) together in a large mixing bowl. In a small bowl, mix all wet ingredients then add to dry ingredients. Adjust seasonings to taste. Spread onto a baking sheet and bake for 10 minutes, until almost golden. Remove from oven, flip the granola with a spatula, add the nuts, and return to oven. Bake for another 5-7 minutes until the nuts are toasted and the grains are golden.