Granola

19 Jan 2012 Comments Off

I am on a quest to find the perfect granola bar for myself, to carry with me whenever I travel. What I am looking for in a granola bar is the holding part, meaning that the bar holds its shape as a bar in my hand, with a minimum of crumbs detaching from it.

The fruits, the nuts and the sweetness come in second because a granola bar is a personal thing. The taste and the choice of ingredients all sit on a board of unlimited availability.

So that been said, I have tried two recipes so far. The first one is very good, has a good tang to it but does not hold it all together once it is cut up. The granola breaks apart here and there, making it impossible to cut a perfect bar out of the entire pan.

Fruit tea granola bars

8 oz rice krispy cereal

1.5 oz seeds

3 oz nuts, any kind

1.2 oz of cookie crumbs

6 oz honey or maple syrup

1.75 oz brown sugar

1 oz butter

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

½ teaspoon salt

6.5 oz dry fruit, any kind

Spread cereal, seeds an nuts in a baking pan and roast in the oven at 350F, 15 minutes.

Mix honey, brown sugar, butter, vanilla and salt together. Bring it to a boil, on the stove until the sugar has melted.

Reduce oven temperature to 300F, remove the baking pan and drop the sugar mixture on top of the nuts, mix well. Press it back in the pan and bake for 25 minutes at 300F.

Let it cool, and cut into squares or bars.

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This recipe is perfect for a granola breakfast, served with milk, in a small bowl in the morning but it falls away from my wish tree!

Second recipe was based from Granola bars, from the book ‘Flour’ by Joanne Chang. I followed the ‘how to’ but not the ingredients as I did put my own ingredients, according to my taste and my kitchen. After I let it cool a bit, I cut the bars and then, let it cool. So far, on this picture below, the bar is holding itself with almost no crumbs, and it is still warm to the touch. I am pretty confident that this Granola bars Shenyang will be the one to travel with me. The recipe reminds me a lot of the matrimonial bars I did a while ago. Lots of fruits inside, the way I like bars.

Granola bars Shenyang

400 g dry fruits cut up in pieces

1/3 cup sugar

480 g water

Mix together in a pan, bring to a boil, cover and let it sit for one hour, heat turned off. In a blender, chop the cooked fruit, until reaching a chunky jam look.

100 g nuts

245 g white flour

150 g cookie crumbs

150 g dark brown sugar

80 g almonds cut up

1 teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon cinnamon

230 g butter

6 tablespoons of maple syrup

Turn the oven on at 350F, Mix the nuts, flour, cookie crumbs, sugar, almonds, salt, cinnamon together in a large bowl. Add the butter and use your hand to mix it all well. Add the maple syrup and keep mixing by hand. Pray 2/3 of this mix in a pan, lined with parchment paper. Bake in the oven for 40 minutes. Put the remaining 1/3 of the mix in the fridge.

Spray the jam over the cookie mix, evenly.

Mix :

3 tablespoons of flaxseeds

3 tablespoons of almonds, cut up in piece

3 tablespoons of walnuts or other nuts, cut up

Add the nuts mix to the remaining of the 1/3 of the flour mix and mi well until it holds together. Spray this mix over the jam, covering completely. It will be crumbly. I myself, used a rolling pin and roll the 1/3 mix between two parchment papers, making it look like a pastry dough for a pie and layed it over the jam, cutting the edges to adjust to the size of the pan. Push it down a bit.

Return the pan in the oven, at 350F, and bake for an additional 50 minutes. Let it cool a bit, cut it into bars and let it cool down completely before removing the bars from the pan. Wrap individually in plastic sheets.