Toasty Pistachio & Coconut Granola
the granola your peak summer fruit deserves
I don’t know about you, but this time of year I literally cannot eat enough fruit. I probably eat more fruit in July and August than I will for the next six months combined. How thrilling is it to pick out a truly transcendent melon? Or to sit in the park or on your couch and eat cherries until you almost have a stomachache. Not to mention the plums! The nectarines! The peaches!!!
You may have heard talk that it’s been a good peach year, and I’ve had some luck with them myself. The very best thing to do with a really good peach is to eat it messily, somewhere where the juicy goodness running all over the place doesn’t matter, be that a patch of grass or sand or doubled over the kitchen sink. But in my book, one of the next best things to do with a good peach is to pit and slice it, toss it into a bowl with a swoosh of Greek yogurt, and treat yourself to a gorgeous breakfast. Enter: a deeply toasty, totally addictive granola worthy of your summer fruit.
This granola is chock full of pistachios, pepitas, coconut chips and sunflower seeds. It’s not too sweet, it’s a little salty, and it’s super crunchy. It has richness from the pistachios and coconut oil, crispiness from coconut chips, and sweetness from maple syrup and vanilla. The oats get caramelized in spots and the nuts and seeds get deeply toasted, almost lending a savoriness to the granola. People underestimate how delicious a properly toasted nut or seed can be. Roasting them for a long time at a very low temperature ensures that they are evenly golden inside and out.
You might be thinking that this many pistachios in a granola sounds decadent, but I say a bag of store-bought granola is expensive anyway, so why not spend that money on good ingredients instead and make yourself a granola worth getting excited about? Plus, this recipe yields a lot of granola! It will keep in your pantry in an airtight container for a month or so, but it also makes a great gift. Wouldn’t you be delighted if someone showed up to your house with a jar of homemade granola? Especially one so tasty that you’d want to eat it straight from the jar? I know I would.
I’m using pistachios because they’re my favorite nut and because I love how they play with summer stone fruit, but pecans are also delicious here. You’ll notice this granola has no dried fruit in it, because I am decidedly not a dried-fruit-in-my-granola-person, but feel free to add any variety you like after baking (dried tart cherries or chopped apricots would be my pick). If you don’t have unrefined coconut oil, olive oil also works beautifully to lend crunch and flavor. If you like you can add ground spices like cinnamon or cardamom. This isn’t a super cluster-y granola, because I like to prioritize including lots of nuts and getting even, golden brown toastiness. But if big clusters are important to you, you can add 2 well-beaten egg whites to your mixture before baking, and stop stirring earlier in the baking process.
The fun thing about making granola is that you can play with this ratio, omit any of these ingredients, add new ones, and still get something delicious. Throw in some sesame seeds, add oat bran or flax seed meal, try honey in place of the maple, add almonds—you get the idea. And speaking from experience, once you start making your own granola, it’s pretty hard to go back to the store bought stuff.
Toasty Pistachio & Coconut Granola
Yields about 10 cups
3 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
1 ½ cup raw pistachios, pecans, almonds or a mix of whatever nuts you like
1 cup raw pumpkin seeds
1 cup unsweetened coconut chips
½ cup raw sunflower seeds
¾ cup maple syrup
½ cup unrefined coconut oil (melted), or extra-virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract
1 ½ teaspoons flaky sea salt, plus more to taste
Place a rack in the center of the oven and preheat to 275 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. In a large mixing bowl, combine all the ingredients and toss until they are evenly coated in the oil and maple. Spread the mixture onto the prepared baking sheet in an even layer.
Roast for 45 minutes, removing from the oven to toss thoroughly every 15 minutes or so. When tossing, take care to rotate the granola on the outside edge of the pan toward the center and vice versa (the edges of your pan get the most heat and we’re going for even toasting). After the final toss, spread the mixture back into an even layer and roast undisturbed for another 15 to 25 minutes, until everything is deeply golden brown and smells super toasty. When it’s done, don't toss it! Leave it alone to cool completely on the sheet pan. Sprinkle the surface with an extra pinch of flaky salt, if you’re like me and you like things a little salty. Then break it up, pack into airtight containers, and store in the pantry for up to a month.