So, I’m guessing there could be worse things do be addicted to, right?

While I’m preparing to admit that I am a marmalade junky, I find this breakfast muesli bread. I’ve suddenly become like a child who only singly eats mac and cheese or pb&j for weeks straight.

Breakfasts, lunches, midnight snacks are spent longing for the next time I can glob juliennes of sticky zest over my raisin stuffed sunflower bread.

As I’m leaving my local unnamed bigbox store with the oversized package of my next fix and realizing I have issues, I decided to stick to my personal claim of not buying what I can quite easily make on my own. I just couldn’t rightfully keep forking out five bucks for a bag of bread.

A little while back, with a few leftover minneolos, a cup of o.j, water and sugar, I had the marmalade covered. So now, it was on to the bread. The store bought, of course, had it’s yummy je ne sais quoi mixed in, so I was left to pick out my favourites, the first of those, being sunflower seeds. The next to impossible task was finding any that weren’t hulled, apparently they are only good for spitting but after an exhaustive search, I found some. They were salted, but beggers can’t be choosers, right? I figured I’d either rinse them or omit the extra salt.
Thanks to my son, I always have raisins, and we’re talking the big fat ones too. He just won’t accept those puny shriveled ones. – Left from the last trip to the health food store, was his half eaten bag of plump organic jumbo flames. They’re about the size of his knuckle, so I was headed for a good start. I had an apple, cinnamon oatmeal and flax, all the good müesli things.

The bread recipe is pretty basic. Taking the knowledge from Mark Bittman and his book How to Cook Everything, I keep my whole wheat bread ratios to 3:1 all purpose flour to whole wheat; doing this keeps a good crust. And that’s just what it needed to keep all the good stuff in and my globs of marmalade on safely top.

MÜESLI BREAD

1/3 Cup Flax Seeds
1/2 Cup Sunflower Seeds
1 Cup Organic Jumbo Flame Raisins
1/3 Cup Steel Cut Oats (precooked), or add 1/3 Old Fashioned Oats, uncooked
3 Cups Water (divided)
4 Cups All Purpose Flour (divided)
1 1/2 teaspoons Yeast (divided)
2 Cups Whole Wheat Flour
1/3 Cup Maple Syrup
1/4 Cup Safflower Oil
1/2 teaspoon Salt
1/2 teaspoon Cinnamon
1 Granny Smith Apple, peeled & finely diced

Cook the steel cut oats as to the package directions, set aside.
Cover the flax, sunflower seeds, raisins and oats with 1 1/2 cups of warm water. Stir to combine and leave 1 hour or up to overnight.
In another bowl, combine 2 cups of the all purpose flour with 1/2 teaspoon of the yeast along with the remaining 1 1/2 cups of warm water. Stir well to combine and leave the sponge to prove 1 hour or refrigerated overnight.
Combine the seed mixture along with the sponge.
Add the remaining 1 teaspoon of yeast granules, maple syrup, oil, salt and cinnamon.
Once well mixed, add the remaining all purpose and whole wheat flours, in stages.
Knead for 5 – 7 minutes or until the dough is springy, soft and elastic.
Transfer the dough to a clean, slightly oiled bowl. Let the dough rest and rise for about 30 minutes.
Divide the dough into two pieces. Shape into two traditional or rustic loaves, placing into two slightly greased loaf pans or onto a parchment lined baking sheet.
Allow the dough about another hour to rise.
Preheat the oven to 425ºF.
Place a pan of hot water on the lowest rack of the oven along with the loaves on the center rack.
Bake for 10 minutes, then reduce the temperature to 400ºF, remove the pan of water and continue to bake for an additional 20 – 25 minutes, until the loaves are golden and hollow sounding when tapped from underneath.

I wouldn’t go so far as to label myself a hippie or anything. Although I do enjoy a good amount of Canned Heat, I’m just not old enough. What I could call myself is frugal. I grew up with granola in the house but it was “Dad’s Cereal”. Which is, of course, why it was so elusive. We were told it was too expensive for us to burn through on a Saturday morning and we were much better off with the Fruit Loops within reach. However, little did my Mother know that as one of the few occasions my brother and I would get along, we would tag team to the top shelf for a sneaky handful from the protected bag of goodness.

Being the rebel that I am, I’ve continued to prefer granola over mass produced O’s, but the one tidbit of price tag always stuck with me. The giant yellow box is half the price of the tiny one I covet. Seeing you can’t stuff air into oatmeal must be one reason for the price difference and of course, that age old saying of getting what you pay for.

As frugal as I am, I tend to never order in a restaurant or buy anything food wise that I could easily make for myself at home. Granola, naturally fits into this category quite well. After recently receiving a bag each of dried papaya and almonds I hit my pantry to complete the list of ingredients.

Although filled with a little more of the good stuff than most store brands, I would call it pretty close to that shoveled childhood handful. All I need to go with it is the bravery of Lolo to commit to making my own soy milk to go with it.

LOW FAT TROPICAL GRANOLA

2 Cups Whole Oats, Old Fashioned
1/3 Cup Dried Papaya, 2 spears halved and diced
1/3 Cup Almonds, coarsely chopped
1/3 Cup Unsweetened Shredded Coconut
1/4 teaspoon Salt
2 Tablespoons Safflower Oil
3 Tablespoons Blue Agave Nectar
2 Tablespoons Brown Rice Syrup

Preheat the oven to 300ºF.
Toss the oats, papaya, almonds, coconut and salt together in a large bowl.
In a small saucepan combine the oil, agave and syrup.
Mix well to combine and heat until it just begins to bubble.
Remove from the heat and pour over the dry ingredients. Stir well to coat.
Spread evenly over a parchment lined, edged cookie sheet.
Bake for 10 minutes. Stir to mix and rotate pan.
Return to oven and bake for an additional 5 – 10 minutes.
Shake granola lightly to break apart any large piece and leave to cool completely.
Store in an airtight container.