Clumpy Coconut Butter Granola
Here’s a really good, crunchy, clumpy granola recipe for you. The clumpiness is achieved by using two key ingredients: almond meal and coconut butter. Almond meal is great when it comes to making clumpy granola, as it forms a coating around the dry ingredients and helps them to agglutinate. Coconut butter acts as a creamy binding agent, along with maple syrup, helping those little clumps stick together.
The result is a super delicious, crunchy granola, with big chunks throughout. It has a lovely coconut flavour and a satisfying bite from the buckwheat and cashews.
If you're not familiar with coconut butter, but you enjoy the taste of coconut, you will fall in love with this stuff. Coconut butter is rich, creamy, and quite addictive. Don’t confuse coconut butter and coconut oil though - these are two different things and one should not be substituted for the other in recipes. Coconut butter is the entire coconut flesh that has been reduced into a puree, so it contains both the oil and the solids.
I like to spread coconut butter on toasts, pancakes or waffles, use it in desserts, add it to smoothies, or let it melt slowly on a warm porridge. I hear it's delicious in curry and soups too.
Notes:
I served the granola with a pink strawberry almond milk here. Simply add 1 1/2-2 cups of strawberries (fresh or frozen) + 1 teaspoon vanilla extract to a batch of homemade nut milk, then blend in a blender and strain. Delicious.
Coconut butter is pureed coconut flesh, also called coconut manna or coconut puree. It is solid at room temperature but will become pourable once heated. With a bit of time and patience, you can make your own by blending unsweetened shredded coconut in a food processor until creamy, although I typically prefer getting the store-bought version for convenience. I like the Nutiva brand.
Clumpy Coconut Butter Granola
ingredients
2 cups rolled oats
1 cup raw buckwheat
1 cup raw cashews
1 cup coconut flakes
½ cup almond meal (you can make your own by grinding raw almonds in your food processor)
½ tsp sea salt
1/2 cup melted coconut butter (also called coconut puree or coconut manna)
½ cup pure maple syrup
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
instructions
Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a large bowl, combine the oats, buckwheat, cashews, coconut flakes, almond meal and sea salt.
To liquify and measure your coconut butter, let the jar sit in a pot of hot water for a few minutes until it becomes pourable. Give it a good stir, then measure out ½ cup and place in a small bowl. Add maple syrup and vanilla extract and whisk to combine.
Pour the liquid coconut butter mixture into the bowl of dry ingredients. Mix with a wooden spoon to coat.
Spread the granola mixture evenly onto the prepared baking sheet and press with a spatula to make sure it is quite compact.
Bake in the oven for 12-15 minutes. The bottom and edges should be golden. Flip the granola in big chunks using a spatula, and place back in the oven. Bake for another 12-15 minutes, until brown and crispy. Keep an eye on it to make sure it doesn’t burn.
Remove and let cool completely. Store in an air-tight container.
