Recipe from Cook's Illustrated, March 2012
Notes: One of my favourite cereals growing up was Quaker's Harvest Crunch, the kind in the big orange box. I stopped eating it some time ago, around the time I went off to university, and around the time I discovered the mixture of coconut, sugar, nuts and oats was actually pretty high in sugar and fat. For a while, I liked buying muesli cereal for the crunch and perceived wholesomeness of nuts and dried fruit.
As I've gotten older, I eat less and less cereal, and granola is something I rarely buy from a supermarket, or order in a restaurant. But the article in Cook's Illustrated from an issue earlier this year stuck in the back of my mind, and I finally assembled all the ingredients to make it. Their recipe is pretty flexible and allows you to mix and match different nuts and dried fruit. My version contained hazelnuts and dried blueberries, a luxe combo I felt was fitting for a homemade version.
My granola clusters didn't turn out as chunky as the recipe described. They were pretty delicate and fell apart easily. Maybe I didn't compact the mixture in the pan enough. Make sure you don't mix the dried fruit in and bake it the oven (as I did the last time I made granola).
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