Prior to Dec 2015 I had never seriously considered baking my own granola. Why bake when you can buy in a bin or a pouch? Well, something changed as I had relocated to E Canton, just west of Asheville NC, still recovering from a bad car accident in NY in Oct 2013. I had wanted to test the waters in some food based business for several years but never found the right situation given the risks. Apparently nothing concentrates the mind like sitting in an in-law apt in a large log home on a mountain in E Canton with your friend Kra Adair who lived in an adjacent property, nagging you to do something.

I had a lot of free time that year and aside from going to the Y and trying to get in better shape, I started cooking more often and paying more attention to what I was eating. That's when it hit me that I didn't much care for the cloyingly sweet granola with unnatural aftertaste and volcanic texture that I had been buying.

There had to be a better way. So in my small in-law apartment research kitchen with the aid of assorted websites, I began testing recipes and playing around with different ingredient combinations. I discovered that canola oil was devoid of flavor and coconut oil was a bit overpowering with a lot of fats. So what to do? You need an oil or something that acts as a binder if you bake a granola or you won't get the right texture. I had read that extra virgin olive oil was a good choice but there were questions about how long it would stay fresh? After looking at the nutritional profile of EVOO I decided to give it a try and noticed that even with a relatively inexpensive national store brand I could taste a vast difference between using canola or regular olive oil vs EVOO. I loved the buttery finish!

With a winnowing process I discovered that dark maple syrup was my preferred sweetener although I added organic coconut palm sugar for complexity. I also found that I liked the uneven aspects of using coarse salt instead of fine salt which is a standard used in baking. Next I had  to choose what kinds of nuts, seeds and possibly fruit to use. After experimenting with the usual suspects, all kinds of nuts, I gravitated to my favorite pistachio and threw in pepitas, sunflower seeds and coconut flakes. Then I found that the coconut flakes cooked too fast in the oven relative to everything else so I switched to coconut chips which worked much better. Lastly I decided to pair with a dried fruit added post bake and wanted something sour so I tried tart cherries. These were good except they all had added sugar so they were a bit sweet . I decided to instead try dried bing cherries and they were unsweetened and a perfect fit.

After making many slight adjustments to the recipe, I began handing out samples first to my landlords Ken and Jane Adair and their family, all of whom lived on the mountain. The first thing that struck me was that Ken said he really liked it because Ken didn't like eating anything and took eating for granted. Noted. Next I decided to make a bunch of baggies and give it away at the Asheville Chess Club. My instructions were to take it home and eat it with yogurt. After playing a few games of chess I looked around the room and saw nothing but empty baggies. Nobody listened to me and everything was consumed on the spot. After a few months of giving out samples and receiving a universally positive response I decided to do what everyone suggested....go into business.

After shelf testing the recipe for over a year I decided that the info I heard about EVOO did not comport with my experience and shelf test so I formed Pete's Extraordinary Granola LLC in May 2017 with my signature flavor Cherries and Pistachios. I have since added another flavor in 2023-2024 Lemon Cacao with Pecans which uses a similar base of ingredients but substitutes pecans for pistachios and adds hemp, flax, cacao nibs and lastly pure lemon oil  for a delicious combination. Also as a postscript I now have a handle of granolagod on lichess.org and chess.com. Thanks for reading! Pete