Monday 16 March 2015

Chocolate and Hazelnut Granola.


If you know me, you will know that I have two great food loves in my life; foremost, chocolate and more recently, granola. I have serious issues because when I am in the presence of either, I cannot control myself. To be honest, I think that this kind of uncontrollable, eat-everything behaviour is entirely justified because like, as if any sane human would ever voluntarily stop eating chocolate or granola?!

This weekend, I made something miraculous happen. I took these two, singularly fabulous things, chocolate and granola, and I turned them into one, absolutely astounding thing of such deliciousness that I literally cannot even use language to express how yum and oh-my-god wow that this creation is. And! As if the stars aligned and the higher powers that be smiled down upon me, this delicious chocolate granola is......HEALTHY! No refined sugar, no dairy, no bad anything, only 100% pure whole foods and nutritional goodness which means one thing - it is more than acceptable to eat the entire batch of this in one sitting!!!! Go on, make some. You know you want to!




Ingredients;

2 cups rolled oats (I use a gluten free variety)
3 tbsp virgin coconut oil (melted)
3 tbsp pure maple syrup
2 tbsp raw cacao powder
1 cup raw hazelnuts (roughly chopped)
1 cup dairy-free dark choc chips

1. Preheat a fan-forced oven to 180 degrees Celsius.
2. In a large bowl, combine the oats with the coconut oil, maple syrup and cacao. Mix this really well, making sure that all the oats are covered with the chocolatey cacao goodness.
3. On a large baking tray, spread the chocolate oat mixture. Cook this in the oven for approx. 8 minutes, then add in the halved hazelnuts, stir everything around, and cook for another 8 minutes or so. Make sure that you don't let anything burn, so keep checking in regularly.
4. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.
5. When fully cooled, mix through the chocolate chips (would recommend potentially unjustifiably large amounts of these). Store in an airtight container.
6. Tell your friends you've made healthy chocolate granola and that you would share it with them, but you ate it all already. They will most likely begin to consider you some kind of chocolate goddess from this point onwards.



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