Homemade Turtle Bay Granola


J fell in love with the granola at Turtle Bay when we visited Hawaii. A recent note from the general manager reminded me to try to get the recipe because while travelling to Honolulu every time J wants the granola sounds lovely, that is absolutely not going to happen. Luckily for me, Danna is super nice and got me in touch with Ceci in the Food and Beverage Department. Ceci sent the ingredients and from there I was able to cobble together the recipe below.

Ingredients:
3 cup oats (we used Quaker)
1/2 cup slivered almonds
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/4 cup sesame seeds (we went with the ones from the bulk food section)
1/4 cup sunflower seeds
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup maple syrup
about 3 cups tropical fruit trail mix (We used HyVee brand with papaya, pineapple, coconut, raisins and bananas, but left out the bananas)

Directions:
Preheat oven to 250 degrees F. In a large bowl, combine the oats and nuts. In a separate bowl, combine maple syrup, oil, and honey. Combine both mixtures and pour onto a sheet pans. Cook for 1 hour and 15 minutes, stirring every 15 minutes to achieve an even color and keep the mixture from sticking to the bottom (you may want to consider spraying the pan with your favorite cooking spray, just in case).

Remove from oven and transfer into a large bowl. Add fruit and mix until evenly distributed.

My Opinion:
Somehow I was more obsessed with the fresh fruit in Hawaii and missed this granola completely, but it is amazing. Good with milk as a cereal, good on yogurt, ice cream and just out of the container.

Sticky Coconut Chicken

If you follow me on Twitter, you may have recently noticed, I’ve given in to Pinterest. I’ve loved finding new recipes and making the ones I find work for us. We tried this dish on a whim and were very happy with it. It was amazingly flavorful, the chicken super tender and just a hint of sweet enhanced the entire dish. I’ll only make two small changes when we have this dish again.

Sticky Coconut Chicken and glaze by Aurora Meyer on aurorameyer.com

Sticky Coconut Chicken

Ingredients
  

  • 4 boneless skinless chicken breasts (the original recipe suggest thighs, but we didn’t have any).
  • 1 cup canned coconut milk
  • 1 Tbsp. minced fresh ginger
  • 1 tsp. fresh ground pepper we used white
  • 1 tsp. red pepper flakes we’ll use more next time
  • Glaze Directions:
  • 3/4 cup rice vinegar
  • 1/2 cup sugar we actually used a bit less
  • 3 Tbsp. soy sauce
  • 1 tsp. red pepper flakes will need to add more next time!

Instructions
 

  • Marinade chicken in coconut milk, ginger, pepper and red pepper flakes at least one hour (the longer the better! We let it marinate for about two hours, but it only gets better the longer you let it marinate). Grill (since it’s winter here, we used the George Foreman).
  • Glaze Directions:
  • While the chicken is grilling, bring the glaze ingredients to a boil over medium-high heat and cook until the mixture is reduced and thickened, about 8-10 minutes (actually took us about 20, but I kept it on medium heat so the mixture didn’t burn). Once the mixture starts getting really thick, immediately take it off the heat! Glaze both sides of chicken the last few minutes of grilling and serve chicken over rice. We used the remaining glaze to dip the chicken and added it over the rice.
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!