What better way to start the day than with sweet crunchy granola? I had a sweet potato in my fruit bowl and wanted to do something creative with it. The granola took very little time to prepare and came out crunchy, slightly sweet and perfect in oatmeal or on yogurt. You can even pack it in a zip lock for a snack or eat it with some milk or almond milk for a healthy breakfast. I had enough left over that I was able to fill a couple of jars to give to friends.
If you don’t have a sweet potato on hand, you can easily replace it with pumpkin or butternut squash. The recipe is also nut free so it’s perfect to serve if your child or another child has allergies. If you want to add nuts for extra protein, I would add almonds or walnuts. My kids helped me with this recipe by mashing and mixing all of the ingredients together and picking out the mix in’s of dried cranberries and white chocolate chips.
According to Allison Topilow, MS, RD, CDN, Nutrition Consultant, adding sweet potato to your granola boosts the vitamin and mineral content and adds additional fiber to help keep your heart and digestive tract healthy 🙂
Carryover Books: Granola Farm, Little Sweet Potato
Ingredients:
1 cup of pureed sweet potato
1 teaspoon of cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon of ground all spice
1/4 cup of canola oil
1/4 cup of applesauce
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
1/2 cup of light brown sugar
1/3 cup of maple syrup (more if you are using a couple of tablespoons to pureed the sweet potato)
4.5 cups of old fashioned oats
1/4 cup of wheat germ
1 cup of dried cranberries
3/4 cup of white chocolate chips
Preparation:
- Bake the sweet potato in the oven until very soft. I usually bake mine at 375 degrees for about 45 minutes or so. This will all depend on the size of your sweet potato. When cooled, peel and puree with a tablespoon or two of maple syrup, apple juice or water.
- Lower heat to 300 degrees.
- In a bowl mix the sweet potato, spices, oil, applesauce, vanilla and maple syrup until combined. Add 4.5 cups of oats and wheat germ. If your batter is too moist, add more oats.
- Mix until combined.
- On a greased cookie sheet, spread mixture. You might need more than one cookie sheet. Two should do it.
- Every 10 minutes or so, use a wooden spoon or non stick spoon to stir oats. Bake until the granola is dry and golden.
- Let cool on the cookie sheet.Once cooled, add dried cranberries and white chocolate chips. Store in airtight container.
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Becca Eisenberg is a certified speech language pathologist and mom of two.Through her own personal challenges at mealtime with her two young children she ventured on creating a website to help parents facilitate language and make mealtime fun. Her website gravitybread.com focuses on facilitating and encouraging language with fun and easy recipes, educational books and recommended toys and apps.
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