13 April 2007

Crunchy

Once upon a time, when I was pregnant, my OB suggested that maybe a birth class was in order. Or maybe I asked her - I can't remember. I asked her about the classes offered by the hospital; she called them crunchy in a mildly pejorative way and gave me the names of two people who gave private classes. I thought crunchy sounded good, so I signed us up for the hospital class. And I suppose it was crunchy - there was a decidedly non-interventionist drug-free slant. Of course, I missed the last class, which was the one covering c-sections, and I had a supremely interventionist birth culminating in a trainwreck of a c-section, but I kind of liked the birth class.

But crunchy? When did crunchy become a quick way to paint something/someone as a lefty-commie-pinko earth mother eating granola in Birkenstocks?

I don't wear Birkenstocks (but I do wear Danskos). And the lefty-commie-pinko earth mother part of me likes to make granola. It's not as sweet as the stuff you buy, and it's incredibly easy to make. I like to eat it sprinkled on plain yogurt mixed with fresh fruit. Miss M. likes it sprinkled on her Crispix.

Crunchy Granola

4 cups rolled oats
1 cup wheat germ
6 T. sesame seeds
3 handfuls shredded coconut
5 T. brown sugar
2 t. salt
1/3 cup oil
1/3 cup honey

  • Mix all the dry ingredients together.
  • Add the oil and honey and mix well.
  • Using a big roasting pan, bake at 350 for 10 minutes, and then broil, stirring frequently until toasted. Or bake at 350 for 25-30 minutes, stirring every 5 minutes or so.

I usually only make a half batch. Sometimes, I use a mixed grain/seed blend in place of the sesame seeds (like one that had millet, flax, poppy, sesame, oat, wheat, rye and sunflower). I use either toasted or untoasted wheat germ - whatever's in the house. Sometimes I use sweetened coconut, sometimes unsweetened (which is sort of hard to find). Sometime I throw in a handful of chopped nuts. In other words, it takes well to variation.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

At the infant swim class we just took, I ran into one of the women (and her baby) from our childbirth class. We talked about how we didn't use ANY of the techniques for ours births that we learnt. But I enjoyed the class just the same. Rite of passage.

The Fool said...

Hey Magpie,
Interesting euphemism. I kind of like it. "Crunchy". I don't think this one has hit the midwest yet. Maybe I can be the trend starter!

YOUCH on the C section. I cringe just thinking of it.