Peanut Butter is so Gawwwthh

You can burn peanut butter.  I was melting peanut butter for the granola I made last weekend and while assembling the rest of the granola, I had it on the burner over high heat, and I burned it.  Oh well, char adds flavour!  Besides, the peanut butter was showing its true Goth nature by showing up to the granola party wearing black.

Chai Granola

Modified from Erin McKenna, “Granola,” in Babycakes Covers the Classics: Gluten-Free Vegan Recipes from Donuts to Snickerdoodles (New York: Clarkson Potter, 2010), 44-5.

1/4 cup peanut oil

1/2 cup chunky peanut butter

1/3 cup brown rice syrup

1 bag chai tea

1/2 teaspoon sea salt

4 cups gluten-free oats

1 cup shredded coconut, unsweetened

1/2 cup hempseeds

1 cup raisins

1 cup mixed dried fruit, chopped into ribbons

Tip: use natural, unadulterated peanut butter to moderate salt and sugar intake.  Use the oil that separates and rises to the top in this recipe.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.  Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper.  In a small saucepan over medium heat, melt the peanut butter.  Remove from heat and stir in the peanut oil and brown rice syrup. 

Open the tea bag and dump its contents into a large bowl.  Add the salt, oats, coconut, and hempseeds.  Stir to combine.  Pour the melted peanut butter mixture on top and stir to coat well.  Spread granola on baking sheet.  Bake for 10 minutes, stir, another 10 minutes, stir, and then 5 minutes, or until toasted to your liking.  Remove to a rack and stir in the dried fruit.  Cool completely before storing.

I ate this granola for lunch on Friday and had a bunch of coconut and hempseeds stuck in my teeth afterwards, naturally.  Why is it such a faux pas to have food in one’s teeth?  Hey—I just ate!  Living beings that consume other beings need to ingest food.  Why can’t that be publicly known with the badge of the event—a little spinach in the teeth?  It’s a big social secret—shhh!  I ate lunch!  I mean, really, why are we humans so disgusted by things that remind us of our animal, um, truth?  Then again—OK, this could become a very scatological discussion very quickly, and so I rest my case.