Iron-Woman Granola!

The reason I started this blog to begin with was that I'm stuck at home sometimes feeling awful due to some health problems.  Well, one of these problems happens to be severe anemia.  Iron-rich foods can be a little hard to take in large doses... don't get me wrong, I like steak and broccoli, I can tolerate spinach, but woman cannot live on red meat and leafy greens alone.

So.  I decided to try my hand at making home-made granola.  My mom used to do it all the time, and I like the idea of knowing exactly what is in my granola.  I also decided to make it as iron-rich and natural as I possibly could, since this whole eating clean thing seems to be working for me.  By this I mean that as long as I am eating wheat/yeast/dairy free, I'm feeling pretty good!  This, unfortunately means that when I DO cheat, (ie: a regular pasta in a restaurant, ice cream from Laura Secord) I end up feeling like absolute garbage!  Kind of like a food hangover.  Will I ever learn?

I will share my recipe, but I will defend myself peremptorily:  I don't follow recipes and I don't measure things.  I will try to give you the basic amounts of what I used, but sorry if you are someone who needs exact measurements :(

Iron-Woman Granola
Ingredients:
Oats  (about two-thirds of a full bag from Bulk Barn)
Coconut (half a Bulk Barn Bag)
Dried Cherries (Maybe two-to-three cups, cut with scissors)
Dried Apple Slices (Same as cherries)
Dark Chocolate Chips (Same as above, but no cutting.  I realize this is bad because of sugar and dairy, but I got the unsweetened ones without anything hydrogenated and dark chocolate IS high in iron)
Sliced Almonds (hmmm.... about three cups)
Sunflower Seeds (same as the almonds)
Ground Flax seed   (let's go with half-a-cup!  Maybe not iron-rich, but come on, this stuff is SO good for you!)
Molasses (whatever is left after making peanut brittle with it when you ran out of corn syrup at 11 o'clock at night and don't live in a city with a 24-hour grocery store... maybe half a carton?)
All Natural, Unpasteurized Honey (one medium container from Bulk Barn, who by the way, have these cool machines in the back that sort of keep the honey warm and flowy, and you pull the lever and pour your own... things like this are fun to me...  whatever)
Cinnamon (oooh... I use little jars instead of the containers spices come in, so I'm guessing three-to-four tablespoons)

Mix all ingredients except oats and coconut.
Grease a large cookie sheet with olive oil spray (more natural than the buttery stuff)
Spread the oats and coconut out on the tray
Pour the other ingredients over the oats and coconut and mix with your hands.
Bake at 300 for about an hour, turn the oven down to 200 and bake for another 45 minutes.
Be sure to mix it frequently to make sure it's getting dried out.

My scissors were stiiiiiiicky!

Stir it up!

A little honey :)

Mmmm.... molasses....

Granola!

I suppose the last little direction would be "Disappoint your husband repeatedly as he asks:  "Are you making granola cookies?  Are you making granola bars?"  Sorry Scott.  It's just granola :)

xo