Maple Pecan Granola

"Where's the cereal?"  I can already hear my son calling this out tomorrow morning.  And I'll have to remind him once again that for the entire month of October (and hopefully beyond), he's going to need to find something other than cereal to eat for breakfast because I'm  not buying any more.

Tomorrow is the first day of EatingRules' month long challenge to eat only unprocessed foods (see the October Unprocessed button on the top left of this blog).  We mostly eat this way already, but there are a few things we'll need to address, and cereal is one of them.  Honestly, most of us, with the exception of our son, do not eat breakfast regularly - we usually eat "brunch", and what we choose varies based on what we are hungry for at that time of the morning (for me, it's usually just toast).  However, my son wakes up famished and immediately pours a big bowl of cereal.  On the weekends, he does make pancakes or waffles, but during the week, cereal is his go-to meal.

So, today I made a big batch of Maple Pecan Granola and I'm stashing it where the cereal boxes used to be. I also made a menu with breakfast, lunch and snack ideas (along with the dinner menu) and stuck it to the front of the fridge.  Hopefully this will make the transition easier for the poor kid so he won't have to think too hard about what he can eat.

I posted our menu here, and there is a link on the right side of the blog. I'm still working on setting up the menu page, so it might look a little different than this one for a while, but at least the menu is available right now.  If everyone likes the menus, I may keep posting them after October (so feel free to comment about whether they are  helpful to you or not).

Good luck to all the Unprocessed October warriors!

Maple Pecan Granola
makes about 7 cups; about 14 servings

• 4 c rolled oats (not quick)
• 1 c raw, unsalted pecans, chopped
• 1/2 c raw, unsalted pumpkin seeds (pepitas)
• 1/2 c raw, unsalted sunflower seed meats
• 1 Tbs cinnamon
• 1/2 c oil (unrefined coconut oil is my first choice, but extra virgin olive oil or a good quality canola work well, too)
• 1 c pure maple syrup
• 1 tsp pure maple extract (such as Cook's Pure Maple Extract)
• 1 c dried fruit (apples, pears, rasins, cranberries, or a combination)

Preheat oven to 300F.

In a large bowl, mix together the oats, pecans, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, and cinnamon.

In a measuring cup or small bowl, combine the oil (if using coconut oil, warm it to a liquid state), maple syrup, and maple extract.  Mix well.

Pour the maple mixture over the oat mixture and mix well.

Turn the granola out onto a 15x10 jelly roll pan.

Bake in preheated oven for 1 hour, stirring well every 15 minutes.

Remove from oven, stir again, and mix in the dried fruit.

I used cranberries and raisins, but apples and cranberries are amazing!

Cool completely.  Store in an airtight container.