The Breakfast Serial #28: Road Trip Granola

Settling in to a new job is never easy, even when it's a super cool job on an entirely new planet. Doubtless, some of you are wondering how my new teammate, Fern, liked the s'mores pie I made to win her over. Well, turns out she's allergic to chocolate for one thing! Everyone else had seconds, though, so I take that as a win.

Still, Fern's not the only one I need to win over. She's got problems with the entire concept of a team structure. It's not personal. But Aspen* on the other hand? He's got it out for me in particular. We don't need someone to make a diary for us, he said. We could have filled Harper's spot with another scientist to help us with real work. Between you, me, and the void between our worlds, I think he's frustrated with Fern's lack of cooperation and taking it out on me because I'm the outsider.

Every OSESWO team has a chronicler, though, so I doubt anything will come of Aspen's griping. Meanwhile, I can't let his attitude get to me too much because we have been uncovering such cool shit, y'all! Who has time to stew over office drama when literally just yesterday we observed harmonic frequencies traveling through the forest root system that we think might be actual language!

Nothing is certain yet. Could be our human brains are making signifiers out of wildly consistent underground patterns for no reason. Could be many explanations (as our team lead loves reminding us)! But the velvet-leaf shimhorn tree seems to be a treasure trove of interesting secrets right beneath our feet. For now, we're trying to take as many recordings as we can while running various little experiments among the trees.

Which leads me to this week's recipe: granola! I know, not a super exciting recipe to break out the mixing bowl for, but a good homemade granola recipe has infinite possibilities (sort of like discovering sentient trees!) and most importantly for my little team, it's portable and doesn't need refrigeration. If you don't have exactly the same fruits that I use, or exactly the same nuts, don't fret a bit. The best part about making granola is that you can throw in practically anything to suit your own tastes.

*Aspen is, of course, also a pseudonym

SCIENCE RESEARCH TEAM CINNAMON DATE GRANOLA

About 10 portions

Ingredients:

• 1 egg white, lightly beaten
• 3 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
• 1 1/2 cups unsweetened dried coconut (I prefer shavings over shreds but follow your joy)
• 3/4 cup chopped pecans
• 3/4 cup chopped walnuts
• 1/4 cup sesame seeds
• 1/4 cup pepitas
• 1/2 cup maple syrup
• 1/4 cup packed dark brown sugar
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp ground cardamom
• 1 cup dried chopped medjool dates

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Preheat your oven to 300°F.
2. Toss all ingredients except for the dates together in a large mixing bowl until well-mixed.
3. Spread the mixture onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and bake granola for 45-50 minutes, stirring every 10-15 minutes, until golden brown and dry to the touch.
4. Let the granola cool on the baking sheet until crisp.
5. Transfer back to a bowl and mix in your chopped dates. You can also add chopped chunks of chocolate at this stage for a little more decadence.

The Breakfast Serial is the fictitious food blog of interplanetary colonist Harper Luna. While the events and people are all made up, the recipes are quite real, human made and human tested (and delicious!), I assure you. The Breakfast Serial is written by Mia V. Moss.

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