The Chicago Diner’ granola
Wavy Gravy
What it is: A mixture of rolled oats and nuts, sweetened, and baked till crispy, often mixed with dried fruit.
Where it comes from: The roots of granola date to the 19th century and the flaky food faddists who saw whole grains as a means to purity. Originally called “Granula,” Dr. John Harvey Kellogg’s mixture of oatmeal and cornmeal, baked and flaked, never caught on, even after he changed the name he’d stolen from a competitor.
Today’s more palatable recipes stem from the 1960s, when the macrobiotic movement once again focused attention on whole grains. While several claimants for its invention exist, a baker named Layton Gentry generally gets credit for popularizing granola commercially in the mid-1960s.
Kim Gracen
But it was the Woodstock Festival that really introduced it to America. Granola became forever enshrined in hippie culture 40 years ago when, on the morning of Aug. 16, 1969, volunteers from the Hog Farm commune passed out cones of the stuff to hungry members of the unexpectedly vast and ill-prepared crowds camping out in the mud at Max Yasgur’s Bethel, N.Y., farm.
Wavy Gravy famously announced from the stage, “What we have in mind is breakfast in bed for 400,000.”
What to do with it: Eat by the handful as a snack, serve it as breakfast cereal with milk or yogurt, or use as an ingredient in cookies and breads.
The Chicago Diner granola
Chef Kim Gracen
The Chicago Diner in Northalsted has only been around since 1983, but its granola recipe is classic.
4 cups quick-cook rolled oats
1 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup sliced almonds
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans
1/2 cup flax seed (available at health-food stores)
1 to 2 tablespoons salt
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup brown-rice syrup (available at health-food stores)
1 cup dried cranberries or cherries
Preheat the oven to 275 degrees. Combine the oats, sugar, nuts, flax seed, salt, oil and syrup in a bowl, and toss thoroughly.
Spread on a baking sheet or jellyroll pan and bake, stirring every 10 to 15 minutes, for 40 minutes, or until it’s as brown as you like it. Let cool and toss with the dried fruit. Store airtight. Makes about 6 cups.
