microwave granola

Yet another breakfast recipe from Real mom kitchen. I really liked this granola, and I have tried quite a few - went through a couple of weeks where I tried 3 or 4. My favorite has stayed my mom's, but this one is quite good. It is more sugary than my mom's, but not overly sugary. I made it after running 15 miles, so I was happy to have a bit of sugar, and all of the nuts and fruit. I did change the nuts I added. (she had 1 cup of sunflower seeds and a few months back I made granola with sunflower seeds then it was all I could taste. Since then, I've left them out.) Her recipe also called for 1 cup of bran flakes. I didn't feel like buying bran flakes, so I bought raising bran and actually used 2 cups instead of 1. I didn't have any trouble with the extra cup of ingredients. You can check out her website for her original recipe here.



Ingredients

• 1/2 cup butter
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup honey
• 1/4 cup water
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
• 3 cups old fashioned oats (I actually used bob's red hill 5 grain mix oatmeal - finally used that up, so next time I will try rolling my own oats. I'll probably add some flax seed though- the Bob's mix has flax seed already in it.)
  
• 2 cups raisin bran
  
• 1 cup cashews
• 1 cup wheat germ
  
• 1 cup pecans
• 1/2 cup coconut (I added a very generous 1/2 cup)
  
• 1 cup almonds (I chopped some whole almonds)
  
• 1 cup craisins, raisins, or other dried fruit. (I used 1 cup of craisins, and 1/2 to 3/4 cup raisins -figured I already had some in there from the raising bran.)
  

1. Combine butter, brown sugar, honey, water, salt and cinnamon in a large glass bowl.
2. Microwave on high for 8 minutes, stirring half way through.
3. Mix in remaining ingredients EXCEPT for dried fruit.
4. Microwave on high for 4 minutes, stirring half way through. Granola should be a golden color.
5. Mix in dried fruit if desired and mix thoroughly
6. Spread on a cookie sheet to cool, stirring occasionally to prevent large clumps.
7. Store in an airtight container.