honey crunch granola.

I've been particularly crabby lately. I can't be sure if it's the never ending house troubles, or the unending rain that threatens to flood my basement all over again, or that my little black devil rolled in the mud and then dashed down the stairs on my new carpet - but I'm in a funk. It's raining on my parade. And really, the only way to work it out of my system is to say a prayer and follow it up with an all night baking session. It works 60% of the time, every time.



With my personal police officer working the night shift, I didn't bother to keep up pretenses at the dinner table. With not a soul to witness my unladylike behavior, I sat cross-legged on the counter tops, alternating between heaping spoonfuls of Velveeta macaroni and cheese and sips of Riesling and feeling incredibly cheap. I thought I might be able to channel some of that negative energy into something productive, so when I eyed a pile of sheets waiting to be folded in the basket, I thought I'd give the fitted sheet my best effort. Really, I did. But as usual, it ended with my foot caught in the elastic and the sheet balled up and shoved into the back of the closet.

I stayed in the kitchen. It's better for everyone that way. Trust me.



I've been thinking about granola a lot lately. I've eaten my fair share of mediocre breakfast foods in my lifetime and once I learned to make my own granola, I wept silently for all the good mornings meals that might've been had I known how easy it was. But I've had one staple granola recipe up my sleeve that I use over and over again and yes, it's possible to have too much of a good thing.



Sure, it's everything granola should be - toasty, crunchy, a touch salty with a gentle chew from dried cherries and golden raisins freckled throughout, but after eating it with some vanilla yogurt each morning for months, it's sort of lost its sparkle for me. There were some mornings where it struck me as so cloyingly sweet I could feel the tiny cavities burrowing away in my teeth. I brainstormed a remedy for my granola problem - a brainstorm that involved four batches of granola in varying states of deliciousness, some with chocolate and cinnamon, another without brown sugar and a healthy dose of honey instead. That's the thing about granola, it has that sort of blank slate appeal, the promise to play nice with any number of flavors.



The success of my late night granola factory is what I give to you today - a slight adaptation of David Lebovitz's recipe from The Perfect Scoop. The important thing about this granola is the honey - you'll want to use the best kind you can find. It's the shining star here. Since honey is the only sweetener in the recipe, I used sweetened coconut for a touch more sugar, but you can use unsweetened, if you like.



Adapted from David Lebovitz's The Perfect Scoop.