With sprouted buckwheat, hemp and chia seeds.
GLUTEN FREE – NUT FREE – REFINED SUGAR FREE
This recipe is inspired by my dear friend Freya, yoga therapist, and the lovely Romina Coppola, her online courses, and the debut of her most recent cookbook ” The Raw Experience”.
I tend to be not the kind of person that counts calories or payes a lot of attention to how much protein or vitamins I eat in a day, as I believe different should be the discussion of what eating and feeling healthy is, but in a recent conversation with my friend, I also realized, that being aware of specific nutrients in food can be very helpful when in need.
This recipe is filled with the most nutritious range of seeds in their raw form, which specifically contains more proteins, omegas, and minerals, to support our bodies in movement.
Ingredients
180g buckwheat groats
15g chia seeds
50g sunflower seeds
45g hulled hemp seeds
60g small oats
5-8 dryed apricots
70g maple syrup
25g raw cacao powder
3-4 ground cardamom pods
pinch of salt
2 tbsp water
Method
Sprouting The Buckwheat
First day: soak the buckwheat in abundant water for 10 to 12 hours.
Second day: helping yourself with a colander, drain and rinse the buckwheat under running water, then place it in a tea towel and on a wide plate covered.
For the next 1 to 3 days keep rinsing the buckwheat 2 times a day and placing it in the tea towel. Depending on how warm your environment is, it will sprout quicker or slower.
You can already use it once you’ll see the little white tip, or you can wait a little longer until you will see the sprout growing.
If you want to have an even richer in energy granola, the night before the day you’re going to mix the granola, soak the sunflower seeds. This will activate the seeds, making the nutrients more available for your body to be absorbed. This is an optional extra step, you can skip.
The sprouts are ready: In a bowl add maple, water, and chia seeds and let it rest on the side for 5 minutes.
In a bigger bowl add the apricots chopped in small pieces, the sprouted buckwheat, sunflower seeds drain and rinsed, hemp seeds, oats, salt, cacao, and ground cardamom. Pour the maple mix on top and mix until well combined. If too dry add a little more water.
Let the mixture rest for 10 minutes to allow the moisture to be absorbed.
Transfer to a dehydrator tray and dehydrate at 42 ° for 12 to 16h until fully dry.
When ready let cool down and store in a jar or an airtight container for up to a month.
Eat it straight from the jar, with yogurt or milk and fresh fruit.
WHAT IF I DON’T HAVE A DEHYDRATOR?
I didn’t fully want to go here, but I new it was going to become necessary.
Certain raw foods require specific tools that more than understandably aren’t available to everyone.
At the beginning, I thought I could just give you a baked version, but after a few trials I realised that the outcome would lack the nutritional requirements that inspired this recipe to begin with.
This recipe is quite special for the wholeness of the nutrients in the selected raw ingredients. Unfortunately, they not only loose their nutritional values if baked but they change in flavour too.
The thing is, that your curiosity made me come here to try and find solutions for you.
What I am offering are alternative options, that are not the same, but still create a bridge to access flavours, nutrients and combinations that don’t need to be only for a selected few.
The first one I am giving you is the muesli option.
First thing you’ll need to do, is follow the instruction to sprout the buckwheat. Once ready, place it on top of a tea towel nicely spread out and on a tray. Find a spot outside where wind and sun can dry it out.
It might take one to two days to fully dry.
Measure the rest of the ingredients, leaving out water and maple syrup, and mix them in a bowl.
Because of the absence of the liquid sweetener, add extra dried fruit of choice. Dates, more apricots or dried mango will work beautifully.
Mix them all together with the dried buckwheat and transfer to a jar.
You can now keep the dry mixture on your shelf as a muesli and use it to top your yogurt, or milk and fresh fruit.
Another thing I like to do is make banana boats, by slicing a banana length ways, spread some nut butter on it and sprinkle the muesli on top.
The sticky granola option.
Depending on how many people will be having the granola, I would suggest you, because of it’s shorter shelf life, to start with half the recipe.
Follow the recipe as it’s written including all of the wet and dry ingredients, and once all combined, transfer the mixture to a jar and to the fridge. You are completely skipping all drying processes, which will leave you with a wet, slightly sticky and delicious mixture to eat straight from the jar or to scoop out and use as topping for your morning yogurt bowl or banana boats.
It won’t have the crunchy element, and will have a shelf life of 3 to 4 days, but it will still be delicious.
If you do go with this version, I would even suggest you to add a little nut butter of your choice to the mixture for a richer and stickier granola. Almond, sunflower or hazelnut butters would work beautifully.
Nature as a dehydrator
This last one I haven’t tried yet, but I’ll share the idea with you.
During the summer, you could air dry the granola following the original recipe, using nature as a gigantic dehydrator. Once all mixed place on a tray and find a windy spot outside. Make sure to cover your granola with a piece of plastic net to keep insects out of it, and bring it inside when the sun goes down or it will re-absorb the humidity of the night.
It will probably take a few days to fully dry.
IMPORTANT:
The only thing I suggest you to not to do, is to use the oven. Not only will it take a long time, consuming extra energy and rising your bills, but you won’t be able to control the temperature precisely which if too high will end up cooking your granola loosing the nutrients we so care for.