Today’s Recipe – Paleo granola

I have deliberately called this “Paleo granola” to get your attention. The big hoopla over eating the caveman way is simply based on the notion that if we eat the way our forebears did, before GMO’s and processing, we will be better off. So anything that they may have been able to gather like berries, nuts, eggs and meat are good. Things like grains or dairy not so good as supposedly they didn’t yet exist. Its an interesting concept but too extreme for me. I think we have evolved, therefore so has our food.  So, my palette is wider and less restrictive. I still do try to stay away from the heavily processed for obvious reasons, so here’s my homemade paleo granola dish.

We have Nancy to thank for this delicious breakfast recipe. She found it “somewhere” and adjusted it to suit her needs and palate, and I have just done the same. I said once before that really there isn’t a recipe that is absolutely new. It’s usually a building on or changing of something else. Can you imagine trying to copyright your recipe ideas? It would be a nightmare. So, my point is, thank you to whomever came up with this combination, but Nancy made it better!

Below is a picture of Sean, Nancy, myself and Mark on a sailing trip to the Grenadines recently. These are small islands that scatter across the short distance between Grenada and St. Vincent in the Southern Caribbean. Apart from the sparkling water and gorgeous “tonic” of the sailing, we ate like epicureans as Sean and Nancy love good healthy food. Look out for a post dedicated to this trip, its food and story.

Shelled hemp or hemp hearts are the soft seeds of the same plant that cannibis (ganja) is derived from. The good news is that it is nutritionally dense. It contains an ideal ratio of the essential fatty acids Omega 3, 6 & 9 making it a complete protein which is the constant search if you follow a vegetarian or vegan diet. It has been claimed that hemp seeds are “the most nutritious seeds in the world.” I have contacted a rasta friend of mine in the hopes that he knows someone who grows “Hemp” and knows how to produce this lovely food source. Then I spoke to Pancho a farmer friend who has tried for 18 years to legalise the use of Hemp products in St. Lucia. Turns out the seeds are also illegal as they are considered part of the controlled substance that is marijuana. Joke is, I can buy it (from time to time) in the health food shop in St. Lucia and it is readily available in the UK and USA in health food shops. This granola is quite low GI, especially if you reduce the amount of honey.

Makes 3 cups, 4 to 6 servings

Paleo Granola Recipe Ingredients :

1 cup almond butter (or other nut butter)

1 cup mixed nuts (I used almonds and walnuts)

1 egg

¼ cup honey (local is best)

½ tsp pure vanilla extract

½ tsp ground cinnamon

½ tsp baking soda

¼ tsp salt

1 cup shelled hemp (also known as hemp hearts)

 ½ cup freshly grated coconut

Guess what? Everything just goes in the food processor until uniformly blended. Spread out as best you can on a lined baking sheet breaking up into chunks as per the photo below.

Cook for about 40 minutes in a moderate oven (180ºC, 350ºF), turning twice so that the chunks get evenly browned. A word of caution here…..don’t be too rough as I was, as you will end up with more crumbs than chunks which is not ideal when eating.

Mark and I ate ours with chopped banana and a dollop of yogurt. Nancy served hers with dried cranberries thrown in. The ways to use this granola are many. Mark said he found it tasted like crunched up digestive biscuits. I agree. So…..there’s a whole host of possibilities right there. Watch this space for updates…..

 

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