Feeling Crunchy

Guest Column by Jodi Nisly Hertzler

Editor’s Note: Jodi Nisly Hertzler writes occasionally for Another Way and is a college counselor, tutor, and freelance proofreader. Jodi and her husband have three children.

Nine o’clock on a summer morning. The task at hand is simple but necessary. We’re out of granola, and that just won’t do.

I can still picture the recipe card taped to the inside of Mom’s cabinet; I can still remember standing on a chair in the kitchen, helping to dump and stir.

Most of my friends have a granola recipe that they claim is the best. Some of them are quite good, especially my friend Carmen’s, a decadent recipe that uses butter. But I know that my granola is the best. It was originally adapted by my mother from the More-with-Less Cookbook (culinary bible of budget-conscious group households everywhere) when she was (appropriately) living in an intentional community. Mom is famous for her granola amongst family and close friends. I’ve made my own adaptations over the years, but the key ingredients and flavor are revered, and my granola jar is never empty for long (it’s never full for long, either).

I pull out my granola pan. A nice, heavy roasting pan, it is coveted by my husband when he needs to cook big slabs of meat. But I won’t allow it to be used for dishes that have garlic or onions in them. We did that once. I had to buy a new pan.

Mom always mixed her granola in a big yellow Tupperware bowl, then poured it onto baking sheets. I think she still does it that way. Years ago, sleep-deprived, new-mother bleariness inspired me to do all my mixing and baking in the roasting pan. One less dish! Woo-hoo!

The recipe is internalized, but I can still picture the recipe card taped to the inside of Mom’s cabinet; I can still remember standing on a chair in the kitchen, helping to dump and stir.

Six cups oatmeal. Only old-fashioned rolled oats will do.

Two cups brown sugar. Not a low-cal food we’re dealing with here. I recently cut back to one and a half cups after a cousin posted the recipe on Facebook and I learned that she had reduced the sugar years ago.

Jodi’s Granola

Two cups wheat flour. This is one ingredient that sets Mom’s granola apart from most recipes, making the bits more clumpy and the oats less of a star—less like muesli, more like wee healthy cookie crumbles in a bowl. Years ago, when I was researching ideas for sneaking healthier alternatives into foods, I discovered the benefits of soy flour and replaced a half cup of wheat with soy. No one noticed, so I’ve continued the practice.

One cup toasted wheat germ. Half a cup ground flax seeds. The wheat germ is original to the recipe; the flax is another of my additions.

Two cups shredded coconut. One and a half cups sliced almonds. Optional: additional chopped nuts.

Mix together—don’t bother with a spoon; hands work better. This conjures memories of my youngest son as a toddler “helping” me make granola, adding each ingredient carefully in an attempt to create a volcano. He’d provide nonstop commentary on the action, imagining what was happening to the dinosaurs who lived in our ever-changing landscape. Coconut indicated an ice age; flax was lava; nuts were meteors or boulders. There were always earthquakes and landslides. Not a very friendly habitat for imaginary dinosaurs.

Now the liquids. Combine one cup water and one cup oil (I sometimes use melted coconut oil—again influenced by healthy eating fads). Add one teaspoon salt and two tablespoons vanilla. (Yes, that’s tablespoons, not teaspoons. I know that’s a lot of vanilla, but this may be the crucial ingredient that sets Mom’s granola apart from all others.) Whisk to combine. Emulsification: the mini cooking lesson I always give the kids with the attempt to combine oil and water. I’m reminded of the time my older son mixed up a batch but forgot to combine the liquids, resulting in some very unevenly-flavored granola we almost couldn’t eat. Then I think of Mom mixing the liquids with her nifty old-fashioned milkshake maker (she uses that for scrambled eggs, too: genius).

Pour in the liquids, mix together (by hand, even though it’s messy). When all dry spots are eradicated (check the corners!), scrape goop off hands and lick off the bits that remain. And then eat more of the raw granola, because—in the way of cookies all over the world—the dough is better than the finished product. Recall years of snitching lumps of raw granola when Mom wasn’t looking. Yum.

Bake at 300 degrees Fahrenheit, stirring every 15 minutes or so, for . . . well, until it’s done. (Would you believe I’ve never timed it? I think it takes about an hour and a half; just pull it out when it looks brown enough.) The smell of baking granola is heavenly, evoking countless memories of cozy kitchens and snow days. Eat a few lumps while it’s still warm and soft. Pretend not to notice kids snitching bites.

Mom’s granola. The smell, the taste, the tactile process of mixing: a trifecta of sensory engagement that ties together every stage of my life. You ought to try some. It’s pretty good.

Do you have a favorite granola recipe? We’d love to hear about it, and any stories or memories about making it with Grandma, Mom, Dad, or children. Comment at www.thirdway.com/aw or email MelodieD@MennoMedia.org. Or write to Another Way, 1251 Virginia Ave., Harrisonburg, VA 22802.