A while ago Alpana recommended to me Alton Brown’s recipe for homemade granola. I got around to making it and I might never buy granola in the store again! It’s so delicious. Not overly sweet, a a slight taste of saltiness, crunchy and completely customizable. And so easy to make. I’ve been eating it on my Greek yogurt every morning. I’ve heard it’s also good as a snack by itself or as an ice cream topping!
Cook Time:1 hr 15 min
Level: Easy
Yield: 6 servings
3 cups rolled oats
1 cup slivered almonds (I used whatever nuts I had in the cupboard – pecans, almonds, pine nuts & walnuts)
1 cup cashews
3/4 cup shredded sweet coconut
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons dark brown sugar
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons maple syrup
1/4 cup vegetable oil
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup raisins (I used a mixture of raisins, golden raisins and dried cranberries)
Preheat oven to 250 degrees F.
In a large bowl, combine the oats, nuts, coconut, and brown sugar.
In a separate bowl, combine maple syrup, oil, and salt. Combine both mixtures and pour onto 2 sheet pans. Cook for 1 hour and 15 minutes, stirring every 15 minutes to achieve an even color.
Remove from oven and transfer into a large bowl. Add raisins and mix until evenly distributed.
Killian and Liz sitting behind Rachael and her husband
After Killian and Liz’s wedding in June, they honeymooned on Maui and Oahu. When they got back to Chicago Killian told me that they met Rachael Ray. She was at Rum Fire, a restaurant at the Sheraton Waikiki, and was filming a show. I didn’t realize that they were actually filmed for the show.
Tonight Dallas and I were watching Juno on HBO. It was the second time we saw the movie and at the end I could barely restrain Dallas from grabbing the remote and changing the channel. It’s not his fault, though. He has some disease where he has to hold the remote and he has to flip the channels all the time. This time it actually was a good thing when he flipped it to Food Network. We caught the end of a show called Rachael’s Vacation and it was an episode featuring the Rum Fire. Not only can you see Killian and Liz sitting at a table behind Rachael and her husband, but Liz also had a small clip where she described the ambiance of the restaurant. Killian and Liz missed the show tonight so this post is for them.
A couple weeks ago we were watching Food Network and for about 10 seconds they showed someone wrapping a shrimp in some sort of wonton or wrap or roll. This got a brain worm in Dallas’ head that he wanted to make it for Thanksgiving… never mind that he never had before and didn’t have any sort of recipe.
Last weekend when we rented car to go to Wisconsin we also ran errands. We ended up going to Costco, Jewel and Whole Foods to get everything we needed… it turned out we were making spring rolls, which I didn’t even realize until we were buying the spring roll skins. About mid week Dallas made a couple rolls and we taste tested.
On Thanksgiving we started making spring rolls. Well, Dallas did most of the work. I just chopped up a few things and prepared the skins. We made a few with different ingredients and sauces and adjusted until we got to something we really liked. In the end we did shrimp marinated in 7 Paths Sesame Ginger Sauce, diced jalapenos, chopped cilantro, chopped leaf lettuce, diced water chestnut and chopped green onion. We tried a bit of Thai chili sauce but it was too hot with the jalapenos. For a dipping sauce we used Iron Chef Sesame Garlic Sauce because it was a bit thicker and it had a sweetness that offset the spiciness of the jalapenos.
What we didn’t think about is how labor intensive the rolls are. Not hard to make, but tedious. I mean, you have to stuff and roll each one and get a technique down. .. which our technique was a little sloppy. .. but at the end? Everyone seemed to love them. It was a fun, unique addition to our meal and was fresh and light in comparison to the other comfort foods that we eat at Thanksgiving.
A couple notes: We got two different kinds of spring roll skins. The ones on the left in the photo below were square and a bit thicker. The ones on the right were round and a bit thinner. Dallas preferred rolling with the thinner round skins.
Not the most attractive presentation, but we layered the rolls between sheets of damp paper towel so that they wouldn’t dry out. Dallas saw online that you were supposed to serve spring rolls within a few hours or they’d get dry. Using plastic wrap and damp paper towel helped keep them moist even until the next day when Dallas and I and Jill and Brian ate the leftovers.
