Get in my Belly

Here is a question: What has 19 ingredients yet is still good for you?

Answer: My muesli. Well, I say mine, but I stole the idea from my wife, who incidentally makes a much better muesli than me, but she doesn't write this blog!

I am always banging on to anyone that will listen to "know what is in your food", which is relatively easy for me as I tend to do the cooking in our house. Also most of our things come from "base form" even when we buy chocolate, which is quite often, we try to limit the ingredients it has in it to as few as possible. As an example, my most recent purchase of chocolate contained 72% cocoa mass, cane sugar, cocoa butter and ground vanilla pod! Now, that is a simple block of chocolate, and damn tasty too.

Muesli was my scourge as a child, it tasted like cardboard and smelt like a dog's bed. But now there are lots of healthy ones out there but many do contain excessive sugar and fats. By making muesli myself I know exactly what is added and can tailor it to my taste. It is ridiculously simple and seriously takes about 20minutes (to use a very Australian saying) from go to whoa, or should that be wow....

Here is the muesli family. As I can't eat nuts, this is great for me as most mueslis now contain them in some form but I am sure you can add them to this recipe.

 Four types of rolled grains: Rye, Wheat, Oat and Barley along with wheat bran

 Pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, linseeds, and coconut

 Dried cranberries, sultanas, apricots, plus cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg powders

 What is this? Well, it is honey, treacle and canola oil. Cool pattern, no?

 Mix it all up and spread it on a tray

 Bake away until it is brown and crunchy

And there you have it!

Full recipe here:

150ml of each of the rolled products Oats, Rye, Barley and Wheat also the same of bran.
150ml of pumpkin, lin and sunflower seeds
100ml of coconut
1.5 handfuls of each (or as much or little as you want realistically) of dried fruits here is sultanas, apricots and cranberries
5ml of both cinnamon and salt
1ml of ginger and nutmeg
25g of canola oil
10g treacle
70g honey

Mix all the dry ingredients in a bowl, then heat the liquids together till they blend well.
Add the liquid to the dry and mix thoroughly, making sure that all the "dry pockets" change colour with moisture. This ensures an even bake.
Spread this on baking paper on a tray to an even thickness
Put into an oven, it can be preheated or not. I tend to use a not preheated one, it just saves on electricity (at 100C).
After about 5 mins when the colour starts to change open up the oven and quickly stir the contents around especially moving the edges into the middle and vice versa. Close and keep an eye on it as the fruit can burn really quickly. When the fruit starts to change colour, pull out the tray closing the oven not to lose heat and mix the contents again. If the fruit is still some way from getting really dark and the rest of the ingredients appear a little light in colour, add it back to the oven only for a few minutes.

Take out and cool. Then store in a sealable container.
Add milk or yoghurt for a great breakfast, I also love to add in some fresh berries too because they are in season now.
It will be nice and crunchy but not to sweet and sickly, and never boring with all the fun things in it.
Bon App
etite.