Granola for Breakfast!

Good morning, rise and shine sleepyheads of the world!

I woke up this morning feeling spectacular after being sick with a cold for a few days so I decided to get up and do something with my life.  Meaning, make some granola for breakfast and lunch and whenever else I feel hungry and in need for some!

I'm trying out a recipe from a fantastic book I recently rented from the library.

Power Foods -150 delicious recipes with the 38 healthiest ingredients from the editors of whole living magazine, foreword by Martha Stewart. (wow that's long)  It promotes organic ingredients, how to incorporate them into your diet, and why they are beneficial to you.

First of all, I would like to point out that I am very strange and picky about cookbooks.  Usually it takes me at least twenty minutes to find one that I like at the library, and even then I sometimes can't find one!  I'm pretty sure it has something to do with the insanely long and dauntingly foreign ingredient lists.  If my vision starts to swim when I turn to a page, I immediately put it back on the shelf and grab another, no matter how high quality it is.  Also it has to have pictures, or I won't even flip another page.  

I know this all sounds really bad, but it's just the way I am.  I think it's because I find more use in the idea of the recipe, rather than the actual recipe if that makes any sense.  Usually I know how to and can make things, but I can never find appealing enough ideas.  So this is why I was instantly drawn to this book.  I mean, just look at the cover... It's seasoned tomatoes on toasted bread topped with some kind of delicous looking spread.  I personally thought right away, "Wow, I could easily make this simple but yummy recipe in a second!".

Another thing that I LOVED about this book was the way it was organized.  The first sixty or so pages are 'power foods', meaning all the essential foods that are beneficial to you in different groups such as veggies, fruits, grains, nuts, seeds, eggs, yogurt, and fish.  

On each page there's the food and then on the side, a list of all the recipes in the book that included it.  Maybe it's just me, but I don't recall seeing this in any other cookbook so I think it's just wonderfully convenient.  So I'd recommend this book to anyone trying to incorporate more natural ingredients into their everyday diet.

Oops this kind of morphed into a book review haha anyways back to the granola!

Since I don't particularly feel like typing up the whole recipe, I'll just do a picture of it:
*also sorry for the super low quality pictures... I couldn't find my camera so I had to use my phone*

HERE is a link I found to the typed up recipe if you can't read my horribly low quality picture HA.

My ingredients (since it can vary):

I used a mix of almonds, flax seed, and later-to-be-added cranberries.

So first I put everything in a bowl and mixed it all together except for the dried fruit (refer back to the recipe for specific directions because there's a special order the ingredients have to be mixed in...).

Next I spread it evenly on baking sheets and popped it into the oven for twenty minutes.  After flipping, they returned again for another ten minutes.  After being cooled, the dried fruits are mixed in and VIOLA, behold the tasty granola!

The recipe was accompanied by an adorable picture of a jar of granola, so I decided to use their idea because I happen to be currently obsessed with jars!  Especially jar cups... see HERE for some adorable ones that I have been begging my mom to buy for me.  My aunt recently bought them and I also saw them at T.J. Maxx, so hopefully those will appear in my kitchen soon *crosses fingers*.
Unfortunately, we did not have any dried fruit at my house at the time so I'm going to run to the store later and add some in (I was thinking cranberries).

Here is the final product of my granola that I will be munching on when I go to my friend's house later today.  Hopefully somebody will make this because it's delicious (and made with naturally sweetened ingredients for all you health nuts)!

Currently Listening To: Elements by Lindsey Stirling

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