Tahini "Loaded" Granola

A recipe from Sesame by Rachel Simons

One DIY project that I always take on is making my own granola. I know you can buy it, but the store-bought stuff isn’t that great. The only exception I make is the granola at b. patisserie in San Francisco. Disclosure: When the owner, Belinda Leong, sees me in line, she invariably gives me a bag of pastries and adds a few bags of granola. When I tried to coax the recipe out of her, she told me she gave it to Food & Wine. I haven’t made the recipe but I wonder if it’s the same one that she uses at the bakery. Whatever she puts in that granola is magic, and I didn’t see unicorn dust listed as an ingredient in that recipe.

But I digress. (However, if anyone has made that recipe, let me know if it’s the same thing they sell at the bakery.) Another wonderful person in my life, in addition to Belinda, is Rachel Simons, the co-owner of Seed+Mill in New York City. Rachel recently wrote a cookbook titled Sesame: Global Recipes & Stories of an Ancient Seed and was a guest on my podcast.

It’s truly one of my most bookmarked cookbooks, but between doing recipes for my own books and putting two to three meals on the table every day (and also, the person who works at home is in charge of the laundry as well), I haven’t been able to make them all. I love Rachel. Well, not in that way. (Actually, I kinda sorta do…)

I had planned to make the Furikake on page 57 (since I always buy it) and the Vegan tahini Caesar salad dressing (page 62) because it sounds really good, but I was also leaning heavily toward the Pistachio and whipped feta spread (page 79), which comes from one of my very favorite chefs and another great person, Ayesha Nurdjaja. Then there’s a Salted tahini caramel sauce (page 158), as well as Tahini caramel corn (page 163) and the Salted honey snacking cake (page 198).

But when I ran out of my usual granola, it gave me a chance to make the Tahini granola in Rachel’s book.

I have several jars of tahini on hand and an abundance of maple syrup. The syrup was for testing and developing a recipe for home bakers for the amazing Maple tarts at Tapisserie bakery in Paris, which I wanted to have in my new edition of Ready for Dessert.

I’d picked up a few liters/quarts of maple syrup, figuring I’d have to do a lot of testing to get the tarts from the bakery just right. But I got ‘em right the third time, and Romain thought mine were even better than theirs. (He’s perhaps a bit biased. On the other hand, French people don’t mess around with telling you the truth about whether they like something, or not.) The tarts at the bakery are a little different and have a thin pâte sucrée crust because they’re baked in pastry rings, and I didn’t want to ask you to buy a set of pastry rings.

Fortunately, I had everything on hand to make what’s called “Loaded granola” in Rachel’s book. In addition to tahini and maple syrup, it also has coffee in it. Say what? Coffee, in granola? Well, many of us eat granola with coffee in the morning, so that’s not too much of a stretch. But Rachel said in the headnote of the recipe that it was a “must add” ingredient to granola, so I added it, too.

I’m going to buck the trend of people who say they don’t like granola that’s “too sweet.” I actually have a bit of a sweet tooth when it comes to granola. Exhibit A: This Peanut butter and chocolate chip granola, which I could eat a whole batch of in one sitting.

But I may be an outlier because if it was up to me, I’d eat chocolate chip cookies for breakfast. However, Rachel’s granola isn’t very sweet at all. It’s only got 1/2 cup (125ml) of maple syrup, so if you like your granola on the less-sweet side, you’ll like this one. And yes, even a sweet-lover like me likes it too.

Tahini Granola

Makes about 6 cups

Adapted from Sesame: Global Recipes & Stories of an Ancient Seed by Rachel Simons

The addition of coffee to this recipe was rather intriguing. Rachel mentioned a friend of hers said it was a “must add” to his granola, so she tried it, and liked it. It does add somewhat of a je ne sais quoi to the granola, but you can leave it out.

The original recipe called for using two baking sheets, but the entire batch of granola fit on just one of mine, which is about 18 x 13 inches (46 x 33cm). If your baking sheet is smaller, you may want to use two, and rotate them on the racks in the oven while cooking so they bake evenly.

2 1/2 cups (260g) old-fashioned rolled oats

1 cup (110g) pecans or walnuts, or a mix (untoasted), coarsely chopped

3/4 cup (60g) unsweetened desiccated or flaked coconut

1/2 cup (70g) pumpkin seeds

1/4 cup (35g) sunflower seeds

1 teaspoon kosher or sea salt

1 teaspoon ground cardamom

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 cup (125ml) maple syrup

1/3 cup (80ml) olive oil

1/4 cup (65g) tahini

3 tablespoons espresso or strong black coffee (optional)

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1. Preheat the oven to 375ºF (190ºC). Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

2. In a large bowl, stir together the oats, nuts, coconut, pumpkin and sunflower seeds, salt, cardamom, and cinnamon.

3. In a small bowl, whisk together the maple syrup, olive oil, tahini, espresso (if using), and vanilla.

4. Stir the maple syrup mixture into the dry ingredients until they’re thoroughly coated, then spread the mixture on the prepared baking sheet.

5. Bake the granola for 12 minutes, stirring it midway during baking.

6. Reduce the heat of the oven to 325ºF (165ºC) and bake until golden brown, 10 to 15 minutes more. (Mine took the full 15 minutes, but check before.) While it’s baking, stir the mixture once or twice to make sure the edges aren’t burning or getting too dark.

7. Remove from the oven and let cool completely. Once cool, transfer the granola to an airtight container. (Or eat it right away off the baking sheet, which I couldn’t resist doing!)

Tahini Granola

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