I am so excited to share today’s vegan oil-free granola recipe! Everyone needs a good homemade granola recipe. Growing up I always went with store bought granola. It wasn’t until I made this healthy homemade granola recipe that I realized just how budget friendly, and easy it was to make homemade granola!
I am a bit of an extremist when it comes to clean eating, but hey: I like what I like! Therefore even the granolas I bought at the store were still not quite up to my standards. For awhile I just stopped eating granola, but I quickly remembered how much I loved it, and this healthy oil-free granola was born!
How to make the best vegan oil-free granola:
Honestly, it took a couple times for me to get this vegan oil-free granola recipe right. The first time I cooked this healthy homemade granola recipe, I cooked it way too high and way too fast. Therefore I ended up with a bunch of burnt granola. I think we can all agree that nobody wants that!
My first helpful tip to making the best naturally sweetened granola is to make sure you cook it long and slow. You are essentially dehydrating the granola, so the longer you can cook it the better. Since this healthy homemade granola recipe is oil-free you really have to make sure you’re cooking it slowly so that it doesn’t burn, but will still get that perfect crispy texture.
My second tip for this recipe is to not be shy with the ingredients. Feel free to add all kinds of nuts and seeds. Not only will this provide more flavor, but it will help to boost the overall nutritional value of the recipe as well! I love adding pecans, cacao nibs, and even goji berries to this recipe!
My last tip is to look for thick cut rolled oats. I have made this recipe so many times, and I have found that there is a significant difference when using these oats versus standard oats. Thick cut rolled outs have a firmer texture, and don’t absorb water as much, therefore they crisp up better. You can definitely still get away with regular rolled oats, but if you’re looking to make this vegan oil-free granola extra crunchy I suggest trying it out!
How to make naturally sweetened granola:
This granola recipe is not super sweet. Therefore if you want to add an extra sweetness I would recommend adding a bit of date syrup, date sugar, or maple syrup. You all know I love my date syrup, so adding it to a recipe like this is absolutely perfect. It’s also important to note that since the base sweetness of this granola recipe is applesauce that you need an ingredients to absorb all that liquid. Thankfully this recipe uses healthy ingredients like flaxseed and chia seeds to absorb the applesauce so you end up with a thick crunchy granola.
If you plan on adding an additional liquid sweetener I would recommend adding a tad bit more flaxseed or chia seed. Honestly you can eye ball this! I like adding more flax, because I find that the flavor is milder, and flaxseed is super affordable!
Simple healthy homemade granola:
I touched on this in the intro, but this vegan oil-free granola recipe is the one for you if you don’t love cooking. Sometimes I get carried away with recipes because I love cooking so much. However this is not always the case. I love a good simple vegan recipe like this healthy homemade granola recipe!
Some of my favorite simple, easy, and affordable recipes are:
- Sweet Ginger Tofu Poke Bowl
- Roasted Tuscan Salad
- Roasted Golden Beet Salad
- Chocolate Caramel Chia Seed Pudding
And more, just search affordable, simple, or easy in the search bar to find them!
Ingredients for this vegan oil-free granola:
- Oats
- Chia seeds
- Flaxseeds
- Applesauce
- Sunflower seeds
- Hemp seeds
- Coconut
- Cinnamon
- Vanilla extract
Healthy Homemade Granola
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups rolled oats
- 1/4 cup flaxseed
- 3 tbsp chia seeds
- 1/4 cup shredded coconut
- 1/4 cup sunflower seeds
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1 cup unsweetened apple sauce
- 1/4 cup hemp seeds
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 250.
- Combine all ingredients together in a bowl and mix evenly.
- Spread mix onto a baking sheet and spread out. Place in the oven and bake for 1 hour, flipping halfway through.
- Store in a glass container for up to two weeks, enjoy!
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This looks wonderful as so many of your recipes are but I am not seeing the applesauce listed in the ingredients. I could be missing it but would love to make this if I knew how much applesauce. Thank you!!!
Hi Julie! Thanks for picking that up, I just updated the recipe, I hope you love it!
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Homemade granola is superior – and this one is such a good one!
homemade granola is so easy to make and i love how you can customize your own flavour perference! wonderful