Last updated on August 1st, 2024

This Classic Granola is a “build your own” version of the popular 1970’s “healthy” snack. Start with a basic mix of oats, nuts and spices and add in mix-ins like dried fruit and seeds. 

My vintage inspiration for this recipe is from a vintage 1980’s La Leche League cookbook.

Granola was – and still is – believed to be a “healthy” snack made popular in the late 1960’s-1970’s during the hippie movement. There are so many brands of granola on store shelves. From healthy to those filled with sugar, you can surely find one that satisfies your flavor palette. 

When making granola you always want to use all-natural ingredients that start in their whole form to maximize their health benefits. You can always chop into smaller pieces depending on the texture you like. From healthy to sweet, to soft or crunchy, putting together a classic granola depends on what ingredients you have on hand and the flavors you like.

Assembling Classic Granola:

1. Start with whole grain OATS
2. Add in a few GRAINS such as wheat germ, oat bran, or flax
3. Add in some NUTS like almonds, cashews, walnuts, pecans either roughly chopped or in their whole form
4. Add SWEETENER use a combination of sweeteners such as sugar, brown sugar, maple syrup, molasses or sorghum
5. Add FLAVOR using dried spices, vanilla, fruit juice, cider or whole fruit puree
6. Add DRIED FRUIT such as chopped apricots, raisins, cranberries, currants or cherries

There are many ways to eat granola such as as for a snack, for breakfast on top of yogurt, in a batch of granola bars, or in a cookie.

To make granola bars: In a saucepan combine 1/2 c. peanut butter, 1/4 c. honey, 2 T. butter, and 2 T. brown sugar and heat until it boils. Then add 2 1/2 c. prepared granola into the hot mixture and pour into greased 8×8 pan. Add 1/2 c. semisweet chocolate chips on the top. Chill for 1 hour and cut into bars.

Classic Granola

This Homemade Granola is a healthy mix of oats, nuts, seeds, dried fruit, natural sweetness from honey and maple syrup and warm spice.Bake this granola up to top your breakfast yogurt or grab for a quick snack on the go. It's easy to make it your own using our basic recipe and swapping out your favorite nuts, seed and fruit.

Servings 12

Prep Time 15 minutes mins

Cook Time 16 minutes mins

Ingredients

DRY INGREDIENTS

• 3 c. whole grain oats
• 1 c. quick oats
• 1 c. pecans or walnuts rough chop
• 1 c. almonds rough chop
• 1 c. unsweetened coconut
• 1 T. cinnamon
• 1 tsp. salt

WET INGREDIENTS

• ⅓ c. oil
• ¼ c. maple syrup
• ¼ c. honey
• 1 tsp. vanilla

MIX-INS

• 1 c. pumpkin pepita seeds
• 1 c. dried fruit like cranberries raisins or currants

Instructions

• PREP
• Gather tools. Chop the nuts and set aside. Grease or line a cookie sheet with parchment. Pre-heat oven to 325 degrees.
• In a large bowl, mix together dry ingredients.
• In a separate bowl, mix together liquid ingredients and pour over dry ingredients.
• Bake for 20 minutes. Turn off oven, stir granola, toss in pepitas and dried fruit and return to oven for 10 minutes.
• Store in an air-tight container.

Course: Breakfast

Cuisine: American

Keyword: granola

#granola, #naturalbaking, #snack, #vintagebakedmodern, #vintagebaking, #vintagerecipe

Please let me know how it turned out for you! Leave a comment below and tag @vintagebakedmodern on Instagram and hashtag it #vintagebakedmodern