For a long time my go to granola recipe was this super simple granola, which I loved for its five ingredient simplicity, but after the bushfires this year I started craving a granola that was a little ‘busier’, so I went back to one of my ancient cookbooks – Marcea Weber’s The Australian and New Zealand book of Wholemeals. My older sister, bought this book in 1983 (according to her inscription on the flyleaf) and she passed it on to me sometime in the late eighties and even though I don’t use much any more I keep around for its historic value and the memories it holds.

Marcea Weber was one of Australia’s first proponents of macrobiotic principles of eating. The book is divided into the seasons with a week of menus from Monday to Saturday for breakfast, lunch and dinner. This was the book were I first encountered exotic ingredients like agar-agar, bonita fish flakes, barley malt extract and bancha tea. It’s a very earnest cookbook and many of the recipes feel too dated to make now but I still love this granola. Marcea recommends it served with soy milk or nut milk, sour dough rye bread and fruit jam as a hearty winter, Saturday breakfast. I eat it as warm weather breakfast with fruit and lashings of yoghurt which is against the macrobiotic ethos but mighty good.

Granola
Adapted from Marcea Weber – ‘Wholemeals‘
Makes – About 15 cups

• 8 cups of rolled oats or barley
• 2 cups wheat germ
• 1 cup of coconut (shredded or flaked)
• 1/2 cup of buckwheat
• 2 cups chopped almonds
• 1 cup of sunflower seeds
• 2 teaspoons vanilla (optional)
• 3/4 cup of oil
• 3/4 cup of maple syrup
• 1/2 cup apple juice
• 1 cup of chopped dates