My grandmother recently sent my mom pounds of fresh pecans. My mom didn’t know what to do with them all but I assured her that I could make good use of most of them. So far I have been eating them the old fashion way, cracking them open and eating them alone. I’m also planning at some point to make pecan butter but I’m afraid my food processor isn’t sturdy enough to handle the job.

Today I decided to satisfy my granola craving by incorporating pecans into a simple and delicious granola. Adding them to this recipe was truly an act of love and labor because I cracked each nut open by hand (sans a nutcracker) which is no easy feat but it’s an enjoyable feeling to make recipes using ingredients from my grandmother’s backyard.

Granola is such a free formed food that most of the ingredients are optional. All of the ingredients I used, I had stored in my cabinets. The result of mixing and matching ingredients turned out quite nicely. As always with plant-based foods, feel free to play around with what you have to add to or substitute ingredients in this granola. The possibilities are endless and up to you. As you’ll see in the above picture, I served my with farmer’s market fresh berries and homemade vanilla brazil nut milk.

Ingredients:

• 3 Cups Gluten Free Rolled Oats
• 1 Cup Pecans
• 1/2 Flaxseeds
• 1/4 Cup Chia Seeds
• 2 Tbsp Coconut Palm Sugar
• 2 Tbsp Honey
• 1/4 Cup Coconut Oil (melted)
• 1/4 Tsp Cinnamon
• 1/8 Tsp Vanilla
• Pinch of Himalayan Pink Salt
• 1/2 Cup Dried Figs (diced)
• 1/2 Cup Dates (diced) [I used the honey date variety which is firm in texture and lightly sweet]

Preheat oven to 250 degrees. In a mixing bowl combine oats, pecans, flaxseeds, chia seeds and salt. Toss together. Add sugar, honey, oil, vanilla, and cinnamon to the mixture and stir until well incorporated. Spread onto a cookie sheet and bake for 45 mins, making sure to stir it every 15 minutes to prevent burning.

After removing granola from the oven, transfer to a mixing bowl and stir in figs and dates. Allow granola to cool before serving. Store extra granola in a mason jar, or any container with a tight lid, at room temperature for up to 2 weeks. Enjoy!