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Thursday, December 22, 2011
Chocolate Granola
by Erika Nicole Kendall
All this talk about breakfast has me just a little bit hungry.
Once I discovered the bulk shopping section of my grocery, I started playing with random stuff, just hoping something would excite me. After being mad that I was spending so much money on store-bought granola, and deciding that I wanted a chocolate granola that wasn’t 349583i4o5345908345 calories (and yes, the number was so high that they ran out of numbers and had to use a letter to count), I decided to say “screw it” and make my own. (For my twitter friends, #independent.)
Enjoy!
1 and a half cups oats
1/4 cup dark chocolate chips/carob chips*
1/4 cup sunflower seeds
1/4 cup sesame seeds
a pinch of salt
1/4 cup honey
2 tbsp brown sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp olive oil
Set your oven to 300 degrees, and spray/oil your paking pan pretty thoroughly.
Mix together your dry ingredients first. In a separate bowl, combine your wet ingredients. Slowly pour your wet ingredients into your dry, and mix thoroughly. You want the dry stuff to be completely coated in your oil mix.
Pour everything onto the baking sheet, and spread it out as flatly as you can. Let it bake for about 15 minutes before taking it out, and flipping over as much of it as you can. Give it another ten minutes, before taking it out and flipping it one last time. Then let it cook for another 10 minutes, and you should be all good!
Toss it in a tupperware, throw some in the fridge, use it for cereal tomorrow morning, stick some in a few ziploc bags (after cooling) and put ‘em in your purse, or whatever! Stick to that, and you’ll be all set!
*Not familiar with carob chips? They’re a low-calorie chocolate-like flavor that has a lot less sugar, and a little more fiber. They have a more nutty flavor to me, which is why they’re a perfect fit for a nutty granola like this. May not be available everywhere, but if you have ‘em near you… definitely give ‘em a shot!
Looking to count the nutritional info? Grab a SparkPeople account or a calorie counting app and plug in the ingredients!
Try this recipe, take a photo and send it in! E-mail your photo to photos@blackgirlsguidetoweightloss.com or send it via twitter to @inetespionage!
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7 Comments
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Where do you get your Carob Chips? This sounds really good. Do you know what the carlories, fat and fiber are and what is a good serving?
Thank you
—Kelly Pollard
I get mine from Whole Foods’ bulk item section. Each bulk item has the nutritional information on the front handle of the item, so you should be able to see it there if you give it a look.
—Erika
I just tried this recipe and it is fabulous! My husband couldn’t even wait for it to cool over before making a yogurt parfait with it!
—Asha
Hi, thanks for the recipe. I made these this evening, and greedy me polished off the pan. I left out the nuts, and when I did the calorie information I was disappointed in how many calories are in honey. I thought if I made them w/ brown sugar, I would’ve saved 200 calories. The carob melted, and it turned a brown color, but it was very good and crunchy. I just dont think sweets are my friend. I’m learning to make single servings of sweets so I don’t hurt myself.
—Lynne
It is PERFECTLY acceptable to stay away from sweets for a while so that you can develop the ability to say no. I think that is a completely acceptable response, as someone who battled with a sugar addiction.
—Erika
Soror I am making this now, but I added 1/4 cup of cut dried cranberries. I too am concerned about the sugar and calorie count. How much is a serving and how much of the ingredients are in said serving…for those of us counting our calories.
—S.E. Hughes
What you’ll have to do is plug all of your ingredients into one calorie counting calculator – something like sparkpeople.com – and determine the amount of total calories for the entire batch you made. If your entire batch comes out to 1000 calories, divide it into ten equal-sized portions, bag them up and now you know you’ve got ten 100-calorie bags of granola. Bada boom, bada bing. Besides, this way, you’ll learn how many calories are in each quantity of that ingredient you chose to use, and next time can decide whether to use more or less.
—Erika Nicole Kendall