Foodie Fabulousness: Banting Granola

We’re trying to eat healthily in this house… well the adult contingent is, at least. You know, start the new year right and all. 

I’m trying to eat clean and follow a low carb, sugar free diet, as close to the letter as possible! I absolutely have to get serious about eating well because my weight has been moving steadily,  completely in the wrong direction for the last eight or so months. 

Nick doesn’t necessarily eat LCHF, but he tries to stay away from eating too much bread and eats well to fuel all the running he does. At the moment he’s training for the Two Oceans Ultra and those long runs make him HUNGRY!

One of the keys for my success will be having easy food that I can grab for work – particularly since I eat at least two of my three meals a day at the office. Having a pantry full of low carb options leaves me with choices and not feeling bored and frustrated.

So with that in mind, I bring you my take on The Real Meal Revolution’s 

Banting Granola

Nuts and seeds -I used a 500g Banting mix of nuts and seeds available at Dischem for about R115.00 – it contains walnuts, pecans, almonds, macadamia nuts, pumpkin, sunflower seeds and coconut shavings. You can really make this mix up to your own taste. 

I like to bulk my mixture up with extra coconut shavings and seeds. The coconut crisps up really nicely when you you toast the mixture. 

Cinnamon – I love cinnamon – truly one of my favourite scents and flavours. I add cinnamon very liberally. You could add other spices too, like ginger or allspice. 

Butter and coconut oil – A good couple of dollops. 

Sweetener : honey, xylitol or whatever your drug of choice is.

Pinch of salt – not sure if this is entirely necessary but I find most things taste better with a tiny pinch of salt. 

I like to crush the bigger nuts a bit, just so that they’re not big, whole nuts. Give them a blitz in your food processor or pestle and mortar if you have some anger issues to deal with. 

Toss the whole lot – nuts, seeds and coconut – into a big, deep baking dish. 

Sprinkle the cinnamon liberally. 

Sprinkle the salt – not liberally, really just a pinch! 

Add your sweetener – sprinkle in the xylitol or drizzle over the honey. I used the tiniest drizzle of honey because I’m trying to go sugar free and eat clean so no artificial sweeteners. At the same time, I do think the granola is nicer with a little bit of sweetness. 

Dollop a couple of spoons of coconut oil and/or butter on top of your mixture. 

Place under a hot grill. This is where you need to be careful! This mixture burns super quickly so I place under the grill for 30 – 40 seconds and then mix it all up. Rinse*, repeat until the whole mixture is toasty brown and fragrant. Don’t walk away while you’re toasting your granola! Just don’t! I speak from experience. 

Leave to cool and store in an airtight container. 

I eat my granola with double cream yoghurt, and perhaps some blueberries or strawberries. It’s delicious and easily sustains me until lunchtime. My only advice here is to not eat it every single day – mix it up with other low carb brekkies like eggs etc. And watch your portion sizes. I use about 30 – 40g of granola and about 100g of yoghurt.

Nick’s Not-Low-Carb version is amazeballs:

Oats, yoghurt, bit of milk and a dash of cream, chopped fruit, all mixed up, with a liberal sprinkling of granola on top. Refrigerate overnight so that the oats soften in the yoghurt, milk and cream. Ready to go, first thing in the morning. 

Please share your go-to work day lunches and brekkies! I can always do with extra ideas! 

Love, 
Hil

* Please don’t literally rinse – this is just a phrase 🙂