Coffee Cake with Pumpkin Flax Granola Streusel & Nature's Path 30th Anniversary Giveaway

This year Nature's Path is celebrating their 30th anniversary!  Nature's Path is a family-owned Canadian company.  Their products are organic.  While browsing their website, the one line that kept coming up is their commitment to leaving the Earth in better condition than they found it.  I love this statement!  With so much mass production of just about everything, it feels like we are abusing our Earth.  I love to find companies that have such a strong commitment to treating our planet well.

Chocolate Granola {SRC}

It's Secret Recipe Club time again!  This month I was assigned Table For Seven.  Table For Seven is written by Erin who is a "mom to many"!  Erin has 6 children.  Her youngest passed away last summer at the age of 31 days....this story brought me to tears.  I cannot even imagine what it is like to lose a child.  My father passed away in February which was and is difficult to deal with.  I cannot even imagine the pain of losing a child.  May God help you with this great loss Erin.

Maple Granola

Awhile back I posted a recipe for Omega 3 Granola which we loved.  It makes a great breakfast with Greek yogurt or a quick snack.  Granola is very easy to make.  I wanted to give another recipe a try that would use maple syrup as the sweetener rather than honey.  I came across this recipe from Craving Greens written by Marie-Eve in Montreal.  It turned out really good...I still prefer the Omega 3 Granola but this was a great change.  The oats come out more crunchy and crisp since maple syrup is used instead of honey.

Omega 3 Granola

We have been addicted to this granola.  I'm thinking I should now make a double batch since it doesn't seem to last that long!  Lately I've been having it for breakfast with some greek yogurt and dried cranberries.  This has become a staple in our home.  It's very easy to put together.  The original recipe had sesame seeds in it.  I added this the first time I made it and we found the taste overpowering.  So I prefer to leave it out.  I don't mix in any dried fruit in it to suit everyone's taste.  To make clean up easy I line my baking sheet with parchment paper.  I have tried foil and the granola stuck to it and didn't get as crisp.

Cluster Granola

The other day I was doing my grocery shopping.  I was walking in the cereal aisle and came to the section with granola. I picked up a packet thinking I should get some to eat with the ton of yogurt I had gotten from Costco (I was trying to make frozen yogurt and had two very bad tries so I've given up on that for a little while).  I read through the ingredients and was surprised there were so few and I already had them all at home!  So I thought I would give a try at making granola at home.   When I had some time I started googling away and was disappointed.  The recipes called for old-fashioned rolled oats...I only had quick oats.  As I continued to search I came across two recipes that used quick oats.  One of them showed how if you grind some of the oats to a flour it will create clusters.  But this recipe had so much butter.  So I used the method for using oat flour and the ingredients from another recipe and it turned out great!  This is great with some yogurt, milk or just on it's own.  I love to have it with milk with some dried cranberries tossed it.  But I caution you...this is very high in sugar so don't be eating a whole bowl of it!