Amaranth Granola
Amaranth / Rajgira granola is not only incredibly easy to make but also light and delicious .
Combine with other healthy grains like oats and millet flakes you get the most healthiest granola to make and enjoy.Do not buy from stores when it can be made cheaply at home with good fresh ingredients and with easily available ingredients. There s nothing fancy about granola, just plain good and healthy.
Amaranth Granola also makes a crunchy snack ,as a topping to go with your breakfast smoothies. There are several interesting ways to have Amaranth Granola in your diet.
Granola can be made with one or more ingredients so if you cannot get millet flakes, barley flakes or even amaranth , this recipe is good to make a simple delicious oats granola. This is a basic recipe for any granola.
The benefits and high nutrition of Amaranth / Rajgira has already been discussed in a different post for porridge. Do check it out for the health benefits in detail and you will make up your mind to buy Amaranth . It is cheap., easily available in most health stores or on line.
Ingredients :
2 cups puffed amaranth/ rajgira grains
1 cup roasted coarsely broken oats
1/4 cup rolled kodo millets flakes , jowar flakes ( skip if not available )
4 tbsp barley flakes
1/4 cup sliced almonds
1/4 cup dried blueberries or any dried fruits of choice
1/4 cup raisins
1 tsp cinnamon powder
4 tbsps pumpkin seeds
2 tbsp sunflower seeds
1 tbsp flax seeds
1/4 cup honey or just enough to coat
2 tbsp brown sugar
Pinch of salt
1- 2 tbsp ghee ( clarified butter ) or oil
Method
Take a large bowl , mix all the dry ingredients well.
Heat the ghee / oil and pour along with honey over the amaranth, oats, barley and millet flakes mixture .
Coat it well over the grains . Add the brown sugar.Stir well.
Now take a greased baking sheet and spread the mixture.
Bake at 180 C degrees in a preheated oven for 20- 25 minutes till lightly browned or golden .
Time varies from oven types.
Allow the granola to cool down , they would have become clumped during baking , break them into small clusters and store in a container .
Notes
Choose any variety of dry fruits or nuts like hazel nuts , pecans, cashew nuts, walnuts , pistachios , raisins., dried apricots , dried cranberries , dried dates , dried figs etc .
There is no need to powder or use broken dry oats , you can use the rolled oats variety too . As it cooks faster I prefer to use the broken oats .
Adding rolled millet flakes and barley flakes is also optional , if you cannot get it in stores. Oats is easily avaialble so you can make a great tasting granola with just oats or oats and amaranth .