Saturday, March 5, 2011

Healthy Muesli



I am a firm believer in kick starting your metabolism with a good breakfast. In winter, I like to eat porridge. I make it with about half a cup of organic oats and water and while it's cooking on the stovetop, I add in a peeled, diced apple, a sprinkle of cinnamon and half a teaspoon of brown sugar. Takes about 5 minutes. Healthy, yummy and filling.

In summer, it is too hot to eat porridge. Instead I eat corn thins with peanut butter (weird, I know, but I love the crunch of corn thins and I am a massive peanut butter lover) or I eat muesli with yoghurt and milk.

I make my own muesli. It makes me feel virtuous. Besides, store bought mueslis often have a lot of sugar in them and are very expensive. I can make a big 2.5L jar of muesli using mostly organic ingredients for about $15.00. Pretty good, considering it lasts me about a month.

The amounts and ingredients I give below are very rough. I go to the health food shop and buy whatever they have got. Oats are the base, but then I buy whatever cereals and seeds they have. It's usually a mix of bran flakes, raisins, apricots, cranberries, pepitas, sunflower seeds, sesame seeds, linseeds (flax), raw almonds or macadamias, coconut, maybe some rice puffs.

Homemade healthy muesli

5 cups oats
1 cup bran flakes
1 cup rice puffs
3/4 cup coconut
1/4 cup pepitas
1/4 cup sunflower seeds
1/2 cup almonds, chopped
1/3 to 1/2 cup agave syrup or applesauce or a mix of both
1 cup dried fruit (I like cranberries and raisins)

Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius.

Combine all the cereals, nuts and seeds in a big bowl and mix in the agave syrup and/or apple sauce (or you could use rice syrup or canola oil and runny honey). Give the cereal mix a good stir so everything gets coated in the sweetener. Just a light coating is fine.

Place on a foil or baking paper lined tray. Bake in the oven, giving it a stir every 10 or so minutes, until golden brown.

Leave to cool. When the cereal is cool, mix in the dried fruit.

I like this muesli with a generous spoonful of Barambah yoghurt (passionfruit, please) and a drizzle of Barambah full fat (dark blue capped) milk. Maybe a fresh passionfruit over the top. A cup of Twinings English breakfast tea with a drop of Barambah milk. A good start to the day.


3 comments:

  1. I couldn't agree more re sugary, overpriced muesli. I don't really eat breakfast during the week, apart from snaffling a mouthful or two of Mr M's muesli & yoghurt (Barambah plain). I've been throwing together a rather dull muesli for him but yours looks spectacular & I'm going to steal the recipe. It looks super crunchy too, which is my number one criteria for muesli. X

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  3. Thanks for the comment MM!
    On the weekend I made another batch of muesli and I used chia seeds, sunflower seeds, pepitas, whole almonds (chopped), oats, rice puffs, 5 weetbix crushed. I sweetened it with 1/3cup of runny honey and about 75ml of rice bran oil and then baked it. When cooled, I added half cup of cranberries and half a cup of sultanas. My crispiest, crunchiest and most delicious batch yet!

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