I never buy commercial brands of granola because they are crappy food masquerading as health food. I will occasionally buy granola from a health food store, but that mostly happens when I’m traveling and have made yogurt-granola-fruit my alternative to restaurant breakfasts.

No, when it comes to granola, I like to be in control. I like to know exactly what goes into it. How much sweetener, how much fat. This is really important, because many granolas contain a LOT of those two things.

I have a few favorite granola recipes, and really wasn’t looking for another one, but then I saw this recipe for buckwheat granola on KathEats a little while back. I added it to the list of recipes I needed to test this week, and it is a total winner. Really, really delicious. The buckwheat makes it chewier than your ordinary granola, kind of like Grape Nuts. You can see the original recipe here. I’ve also included it below, exactly as I made it.

Crunchy Buckwheat Granola

Dry Ingredients:
2 cups raw rolled oats
1/4 cup whole raw almonds [OR any nuts you like]
3/4 cup raw buckwheat
3/4 cup raw sunflower seeds

Wet Ingredients
1/4 cup coconut oil
1/8  cup honey
1/8 cup maple syrup
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla

Mixed in:
1/2 cup coconut
1/2 cup raisins (I think dried cranberries would be really good, too)

  1. Combine all ingredients except coconut and dried fruit in a large bowl. 
  2. Bake at 300* for one hour in a 9×9 metal baking pan. Stir every 30 minutes. Color should be golden brown.
  3. Remove from oven and stir in coconut and currants (these will toast a little from being with the other ingredients). Stir every half our or so while cooling – the granola will clump together and some will stick to the bottom. It’s ok.
  4. Cool completely before putting into a container.