Easy and nutritious Cooling Summer Granola

Making granola at home is a lot easier than you may think. Homemade ones taste way better than the store bought ones in my opinion. And you can adjust flavours or make different flavours as per your liking. So there is hardly any reason not to make them at home.

This is a cooling summer granola, so it has got to have some cooling ingredients, doesn’t it?! By cooling I mean ingredients that have a cooling effect on the body. So let’s see what goes into making this granola.

Dry Ingredients

Granola in the most general sense is made with Oats as the main ingredient, followed by some nuts, dried fruits and/or some seeds.

This recipe uses old fashioned rolled oats. These are different from quick cooking oats. For making rolled oats, Oats are steamed and rolled into flakes. Quick cooking oats are oats steamed for longer and rolled thinner. Rolled oats provide a better texture and crunch in recipes like granola.

I have used almonds and cashews in this granola recipe but you can use any other nuts that you like, in the same quantity. Seeds provide a lot of nutrition and healthy fats too. I have used a mix of pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds and melon seeds. You can use chia seeds, flaxseeds etc too.

Dried fruits bring a lovely burst of sweetness and nutrition. I have used dates here but dried fruits like raisins or apricot will work beautifully here too.

Flavours

Well the most important thing about a cooling granola should be its cooling spices, isn’t it?!

This recipe uses a blend of green cardamom, fennel and dried edible rose petals. All these ingredients have cooling effects on the body and they taste wonderful when used together!

The main sweetener in this recipe is jaggery, made into a syrup along with some ghee. This syrup coats all the dry ingredients and lets the flavours distribute evenly throughout the granola. When baked, the caramelisation helps in making the granola crunchy.

Here are all the measurements and the detailed written recipe along with some notes!

Cooling Summer Granola

Serves: 10 Prep Time: 20 mins Cooking Time: 30 mins 30 mins

Rating: 5.0/5

( 1 voted )

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Ingredients

2 cup - Oats

1/4 cup - Chopped Almonds

1/4 cup - Chopped Cashews

1/2 cup - Mixed seeds

1/2 cup - Jaggery

1/4 cup - Water

2 tbsp - Ghee

1 tsp - Cardamom powder

1 tsp - Crushed fennel

1/4 tsp - Salt

1/4 cup - Dates or Raisins

1/2 cup - Dried edible rose petals

Instructions

1. In a bowl, combine the oats, chopped nuts and mixed seeds and set aside.
2. Take the jaggery and water in a pan, place it over medium heat and stirring occasionally, bring it to a boil.
3. Reduce the heat to low and let the syrup cook for 2-3 minutes.
4. Switch off the heat and add the ghee, powdered cardamom, roughly crushed fennel and salt. Give it a good mix.
5. Now pour this syrup over the oats, nuts and seeds mixture. Using a spatula, give it a very good mix so the syrup coats everything evenly.
6. Transfer this into a parchment lined baking tray and spread it all around evenly in a thin layer.
7. Bake it in a preheated oven for around 20-25 minutes, depending on your oven.
8. Give the granola a good mix around half way through.
9. Once done, the granola should be nicely golden.
10. Take the tray out of the oven and let it cool completely to room temperature. It will crisp up once cold.
11. Add the chopped dates/dried fruit and the dried rose petals and give everything a final mix.
12. Store the granola in a clean airtight jar.

Notes

1. You can make this granola with quick cooking oats too, but the bake time will be slightly shorter.
2. Use any combination of nuts of your preference in the same quantity mentioned in the recipe.
3. You can also use different kinds of seeds, just keep the total quantity same as the recipe.
4. When you are mixing the jaggery in with the dry ingredients, if you notice a little leftover jaggery syrup at the bottom of the bowl when transferring the granola on the baking tray, leave that extra syrup in the bowl and don't add that in. This can happen if the jaggery syrup did not thicken enough.  A little bit of leftover syrup won't reduce sweetness of the granola. 
5. Always add the dried fruits after the granola has cooled down. For this recipe, it also applies to the rose petals.
6. Store the granola in an airtight jar and it will remain fresh for a couple of weeks.

Did You Make This Recipe?

Have you made this recipe? Tag me on Instagram at @VanillaTrails and use the hashtag #MadeWithVanillaTrails.