Gingerbread Granola {Gluten-Free} for #BobsRedMill

{Congrats to Linda for winning my My Bakers Box giveaway last week! Can’t wait for you to bake up a storm, girl!}

So today I’m actually going to talk about food on my food blog (instead of completely random things like my year in Facebook statuses and goodness in this world). Imagine that.

Exactly zero times a year before I became a food blogger, I ate gingerbread. Zero, zip, zilch.

Watch Harry Potter movies 1-7 five times on ABC Family? You betcha. But toss me the whole lot of holiday favorites–pumpkin pie, peppermint, figgy pudding, fruitcake–and you might as well be feeding your sink’s garbage disposal for all I cared.

Don’t get me wrong: I loved gingerbread in theory. And I adore the spicy smell of it wafting through the bustling supermarkets during holiday season. But gingerbread was to me what suave guys who get your number after a 5-minute conversation at Starbuck’s are to me now: romantic in theory or Hollywood rom-coms; kinda gross in real life. I may or may not be referring to a off-puttingly familiar Starbuck’s incident last Wednesday.

These days, though–boy, am I a canary singing a new tune! Ever since I bought my first jar of molasses a year ago, I’ve been scouring and searching and scavenging to indecent proportions for something to do with it. You might have seen my Gingerbread Obsessive Round-Up on Friday?

But shopping/gifting/browsing season is inversely correlated to the amount of time any of us has in the kitchen during this busy season, meaning the more gingerbread recipes I bookmark, the less chance I’ll ever have of actually making one before next Christmas. Does anybody else face this (very real) struggle? Jeepers, I must’ve bookmarked at least 50 in the past 72 hours alone!

That’s why, when I was browsing my dear friend Kelly’s blog the other day, I was so so excited to see a recipe for gingerbread granola! Her recipes never fail me and they always look so darn lip-licking good. I had a White Elephant exchange to attend that night, so I immediately made a few tweaks and whipped up a batch. After waiting impatiently for it to cool, during which time I may have burned my tongue more than once popping hot delicious clusters into my mouth (so worth it), I stuffed what I could bear to give away in a jar and brought the whole shebang to the party.

It’s not often I get to pat myself on the back for a recipe well done without feeling embarrassed at all–but let me tell you: the friend who won my granola unwrapped it, took a sniff, and then devoured half of the jar right then and there. I actually felt pretty jealous for all 30 seconds or so that the granola lasted.

 

Oh, oh! And I haven’t even told you the best part yet. If you’re thinking about gifting this granola, which you should, it’s completely gluten-free, thanks to a generous sampler pack I received from Bob’s Red Mill. If you haven’t met Bob Moore, the friendly face behind their company, you need to do so ASAP because he is just wonderful (I’m speaking from what I’ve seen on BRM’s Instagram). I also had the loveliest experience working with the Bob’s Red Mill representative, who was absolutely inviting and excited to work together.

Because I’ve been playing with the idea of developing more diet-sensitive recipes lately, I requested a bunch of GF options: quinoa flour, brown rice flour, and of course, these gluten-free quick cooking oats! If you are looking for some great health-friendly baking ingredients, you should definitely check out the rest of their products on Bob’s Red Mill’s catalogue.

Image courtesy of Bob’s Red Mill.

 Just a few more days until Christmas (if you’re celebrating it) and a bit more of the holidays left! What edible treats will you be gifting this season?

Gingerbread Granola for #BobsRedMill

OhmygoodnessGOOD! I've gifted this crunchy, spicy granola for the holidays and it gets rave reviews from all my recipients. A perfect gift idea if you're feeling generous--a perfect private brekkie or snack if you're feeling hungry! Recipe adapted from Life Made Sweeter.

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Ingredients

• 3 cups Bob's Red Mill Gluten-Free Quick-Cooking Oats
• 1/2 cup almond flour (or all-purpose flour if you don't need GF)
• 1 cup sweetened coconut flakes
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup coconut oil
• 3 tablespoons maple syrup
• 2 tablespoons molasses
• 3 tablespoons brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 275 degrees F.
2. Line a cookie sheet or 9x13-inch baking pan with foil and lightly grease the foil. Dump oats, flour, coconut flakes, baking powder, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and salt on prepared cookie sheet. Mix the dry ingredients together briefly and set aside.
3. In a pot, heat coconut oil, maple syrup, molasses, and brown sugar. Heat over medium flame and whisk until all ingredients are combined. Turn off heat and stir in vanilla.
4. Pour mixture over dry ingredients and use a wooden spoon to evenly coat oat mixture.
5. Bake in preheated oven for 45-55 minutes, stirring granola at 15-minute intervals until mixture begins to clump and turn slightly crispy. Remove pan from oven and allow to continue cooling completely--at this stage, your granola will form clusters and turn nice + crispy!

I received a variety of products from Bob’s Red Mill to sample and test. I was not required to write a post but chose to do so because I love their products! All opinions expressed in this post are, as always, 100% mine.