Blog

And speaking of temperament… I’m pretty sure I’m unfit to be director of marketing and sales in this season of Black Friday emails.  Ugh!  I can hardly stand it.  When I go through my inbox first thing in the morning, I feel like I’m playing a Walking Dead video game, mowing down advertisements like walkers (or are they wallet-biters).  I don’t exactly stab them in the head, but I summarily sweep them off into the trash, knowing full well that they will resurrect themselves in my inbox the next day.  (And knowing all the while that some poor soul like me probably spent hours putting them together.  I guess empathy has its limits.)

This recipe is ratio- and technique-based, time tested, bulk tested, and adapted to the home kitchen.   It ensures spectacular granola without intruding on your most basic right to express yourself by choosing your own ingredients in your own kitchen.  What could be better than that?  Even the ratios and techniques can and should be adapted to your preferences and equipment, but this recipe will provide the solid starting place to make judicious decisions. 

For years I’ve wanted to post a granola recipe for fans who appreciate our style of granola but need to accommodate dietary restrictions (or aversions), or feel compelled to experiment with variations, or want the great pleasure of making granola themselves.  Or perhaps you just enjoy reading recipes.

Okay, pantophobia or not, there are at least a few things I’m not afraid of.

Like, Turks, for example. 

Let me explain:  Earlier this month I visited my father who now lives in Basel, Switzerland. Basel is a beautifully quaint, sophisticated, cosmopolitan place with historic fountains, ancient Roman ruins, and modern pharmaceutical factories.  Nearly everybody I met had traveled widely and spoke English.  And yet, I kept overhearing the same kinds of worry-mongering that we’re used to hearing in the US about the dangerous lower-income immigrant section of town.  Who knew?!  Turks.  Turks not learning German.  Turks not assimilating. Turks keeping their wives under lock and key. (And don't get me wrong--I don't mean this as Swiss-bashing.  The Swiss have far more refugees per capita than the US.)

This summer, on our annual visit to Cedar Point (a rollercoaster park in Ohio), I rode something called The Gatekeeper (you can virtually ride it here) which turned out to be an ideal apparatus to get better acquainted with my growing fear of heights. 

I, honestly, don’t get my fear of heights. Back in junior high, I seriously considered making a career out of getting girls to scream at me by standing at the edge of cliffs or ledges.  I once solved a lost key problem and impressed my now wife by scaling a 3-story apartment building and going in the skylight.  And enthralling as this fear may be, it doesn’t always pre-register in the cognitive part of my brain, which means I could look at The Gatekeeper, and think, goofily, sure why not.  It wasn’t until I was locked in and making the 170 foot initial ascent, that both my body and brain registered an entirely different take on the situation.

Last weekend my wife and I drove our daughter to a camp in up-state new york (Saranac) where she will be volunteering for the month.  Dropping her off was a bittersweet parental moment:  our daughter growing up… enough for a full month away from home—and in a relatively remote location (with a no cellphone policy! ouch!)  We knew she’d be homesick. She might even have a few moments of missing us as much as we miss her.  Plus--sadly--this is just the beginning.  She starts college this fall.