Granola Bars

  

  
I am a secret hippy. The smell of food co-ops makes me all nostalgic, because I hung around so many hippies when I was a kid. There is something about the type of utterly sincere yet completely dodgy presentation food co-ops have that feels very homey to me. I started thinking about it after I made these when I had a huge jones for granola bars last week. The toasty oatmeal and burnt raisin aroma kinda brought it back for me. Probably the sugar rush might have had something to do with the sudden feeling of well being too. These are not some dreary, self righteous wrestling match for your jaw and GI tract, they are cookies, by goll, and they are delicious. They are also good for breakfast, smushed into warm milk, with sliced bananas.

2 1/2 cups old fashioned oatmeal
1/2 cup raw sunflower seed kernels
1/2 cup toasted nuts
1/2 cup raisins
1/2 cup chopped date bits
1/4 cup toasted flax seeds
1 T butter
1 t oil
1/3 cup honey
1/3 cup brown sugar
2 tsp vanilla
pinch of salt

Put the oatmeal and the sunflower seeds on  a sheet pan and toast them at 350 for about half an hour. Stir them every few minutes, or they will burn. When you take them out, turn the oven down to 300.

Put the butter, oil, honey, sugar, vanilla and salt in a small sauce pan over medium heat and stir until the sugar has all dissolved. Mix all the ingredients together and press into an even layer in an oiled 9 x13" pan. Bake for half an hour. Let them get mostly cool before you cut them into bars.

notes-

1. The kind of nuts and seeds you use is really not important. Basically you have 2 and a half cups oatmeal to one cup fruit and one cup nuts and seeds. Mine have hazelnuts, because that's what I got. I did this with sesame seeds once before this post, and they were a tad bitter; flax seed is more popcorny.
2. It's important to get the ingredients toasted. They taste better.
3. These get sticky mighty fast. Keep them in an airtight container or wrap them individually.
4. They are really sticky before they are cooked too. Use one of those silicone spatulas to press the mix into the pan or it will get all over your hands. Press them down again as soon as they come out of the oven too, since they will poof up a bit as they bake.