This weeks gift ideas all come from the kitchen which in my home is the heart of our home so these are gifts from the heart : )
Gifts from the kitchen are so special. Spanish women love to feed people, it is how we show our love. Anyone who has ever eaten at my parents house knows this. They will feed you until you cry uncle. If you do not eat they take it personally, kind of like you don’t like them. In my world, food is love. I love to make food for those I love and even those I just kind of like too.
Do you remember my hunt for the perfect granola bar, well a few weeks and many many batches later I finally came up with a recipe that my family loves. I took a bunch to park day and everyone there liked it (at least they said they did). In one day my kids and friends ate 40 bars!
Some of this years goodie bags will have these granola bars in them so I am sharing the recipe with you in case you want to make them too. I wrapped them in parchment paper with a strip of brown paper bag from Whole Foods which I turned to the blank side then tied it with embroidery floss.
Chewy granola bars
2 c oats
1 c wheat bran (this stuff is really inexpensive in the bulk food section)
1 c sunflower seeds
1 c puffed millet
1 c raisins
3/4 c brown sugar
1/2 c honey
4 tbs butter
2 tsp vanilla bean paste (substitute extract if you don’t have paste)
1/2 tsp sea salt
Preheat oven to 400 F. Toast the oats and sunflower seeds in the oven for 10 minutes.
In the meanwhile, in a saucepan, bring to a simmer the sugar, honey, butter, salt and vanilla. This will be the glue in the recipe.
Put all the dry ingredients in a nice big bowl
pour in your “glue” and mix it all up really well.
Grease a baking pan (or line the pan with parchment paper). I did not use the parchment paper but it does make it easier to pull out the granola from the pan. Press it all into the pan really firmly with the spoon then cover it with some wax paper and press down really hard all over.
turn out granola onto a counter and slice into bars
Wrap them in parchment or wax paper and don’t forget to keep some for yourself.
Ok, so onto other peoples ideas:
I love gifts in jars. Here is a super easy one.
and here
to top off your jars, labels
Now imagine you open a pretty little box and inside you find homemade Twix bars. Check out the tutorial here.
I had many more ideas but my computer is taking an hour to upload each picture : (
If you enjoyed this post, please consider leaving a comment or follow me by email at the top right hand of the screen to have future posts sent to you. Tricia (Crunchy Catholic Momma)
Hannah, You can just leave it out. I put it in to have extra nutrition but it would taste the same without it.
This recipe looks so good. I'd love to try it. I have quite a few bags of puffed millet that I've been wondering what to do with. Is there anything you can substitute for the wheat bran since my husband is gluten intolerant?
Those looks so good!!!
oh, those granola bars look so good. I happen to have some puffed millet and can't wait to try them.
Lousie, You don't bake them. The only baking is roasting the oats and nuts in the beginning and cooking the liquids that are used as glue. Then you mix it all up and press hard into a pan and let cool. That is it : )
Just wondering if maybe you had left out a step about baking the granola bas or do they just 'set' on their own?
Josette, That is the great thing about granola, you can put whatever you want in there : )
Megan, I was thinking of you as I wrote it lol.
will definetly be making the granola bars….might have to add some chocolate chips….
Woohoo! We've been waiting for your recipe – awesome! Delicious!
Uhm, yum! I really shouldn't have read this right before lunch. Great ideas, and the granola bars looks so tasty!