Once you get used to having a jar of this homemade Cherry Coconut Pecan Granola in your pantry, you’ll never want to go back to store-bought varieties.
Last Christmas, each of my daughters wanted to give homemade food gifts to family and friends. The eldest made two types of fudge. My youngest made this granola. We started with Ina Garten’s granola recipe experimentation, my daughter settled on these ingredients.
I’ve found that when kids cook themselves, they are more likely to eat what they make. Even better, when they create their own recipe, they take ownership of food preparation on an entirely different level. My daughter calls this “her granola” and proudly creates a batch whenever requested.
If you don’t care for cherries, coconut, or pecans, be creative and adjust the recipe like we did! We sometimes substitute different dried fruits or nuts depending on what we have in the pantry. Once we added some wheat bran for additional fiber. The recipe is quite flexible.
A few notes about ingredients from the chef: She likes to chop the pecans and dried cherries into chunks. In our house, we let little kids use big knives (with supervision) and chopping is her favorite part
They are small enough to spread throughout the granola so you can find some nuts and cherries in every bite and big enough to enjoy chewy and crunchy textures. We love the Montmorency cherries from Aldi.
Our favorite coconut is Bob’s Red Mill unsweetened coconut flakes. If you use the sweetened coconut found in grocery stores, your granola will be (guess what?) much sweeter! These flakes are also smaller so they spread throughout the oats better.
The result is a well-mixed combination of goodies providing all the flavors in almost every bite.
One last tip, when you are baking the granola, be sure to take it out of the oven periodically as directed to mix it and turn it. It helps achieve an evenly brown, crunchy granola. We can fit this full batch on one large sheet pan.
Though kids use big knives over here, they don’t yet take hot things in and out of the oven. So, I manage this part of the process with a large spatula, turning the granola and redistributing it evenly across the pan a few times during the baking process until it’s the golden color we like.
How do we eat homemade granola?
- On Greek yogurt with fresh fruit
- In a bowl with milk
- Over vanilla ice cream
- By the handful
Enjoy and let us know how you customize the recipe to your liking!
Cherry Coconut Pecan Homemade Granola
Makes 15, 1/2 cup servings
4 cups old fashioned oats (gluten-free oats if desired)
1 1/2 cups unsweetened coconut
1 cup coarsely chopped pecans
1 cup coarsely chopped cherries
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/3 cup honey
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Mix together oats, coconut, pecans, cherries, salt, and cinnamon. Stir in a bowl until well combined. Drizzle oil and honey over top. Mix with a spoon until evenly coated.
Spread granola on a baking
Remove from the oven when it is golden brown and let it cool.
Store granola in an airtight container.
(The granola will last for weeks but I bet you won’t be able to keep it that long!)