Make my easy homemade granola with rolled oats, almonds, honey, and vanilla. Save a little money and make granola at home!
I love making popular store-bought snacks at home. It usually saves a bit of money, and from what I’ve seen, the homemade version almost always tastes better! This homemade granola recipe is fabulous, and while I’ve made mine with honey and almonds, you can easily adapt it to what you love.
I love how this granola recipe keeps the sugar on the lower end and calls for ingredients I already have sitting in my kitchen. For more homemade goodies, try my soft and chewy granola bars, baked granola bars, and these peanut butter granola bars.
Key Ingredients
- Oats: I love old-fashioned rolled oats for this granola. Instant or quick-cooking oats won’t have the same texture.
- Almonds: Sliced almonds are lovely, but you can absolutely substitute your favorite nuts or seeds.
- Olive Oil or Butter: You can use either (coconut oil works, too).
- Honey: I love the floral sweetness of honey, but you can substitute maple syrup or sugar (my favorite being coconut sugar).
- Vanilla, Cinnamon, and Salt: These make our granola taste incredible! I highly recommend them! Feel free to add more spice with warm baking blends like pumpkin spice or apple pie spice.
Making homemade granola is easier than you might think! Simply stir all your ingredients together, spread them onto a baking sheet, and then bake until lightly golden brown.
One trick when making granola is to stir it a few times while it bakes in the oven. Otherwise, you might have some overdone oats around the edges. Once cool, enjoy it alone or with yogurt or milk. It even keeps for up to 2 weeks!
Homemade Honey Almond Granola
- PREP
- COOK
- TOTAL
Making granola at home is simple. This granola recipe has a base of rolled oats and sliced almonds, but feel free to change the nuts or add dried fruit like raisins, currants, dried figs, cherries … the list can go on. Think of homemade granola as pantry spring cleaning. Have a tiny bit of nuts left in a bag at the back of your pantry? Add it to your granola.
You Will Need
2 cups (226g) old fashioned rolled oats
3/4 cup (75g) sliced almonds
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, melted coconut oil, or melted butter
3 tablespoons honey
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Pinch of sea salt
Directions
1Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C). Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or aluminum foil.
2Prepare granola: Combine the oats and sliced almonds in a medium bowl. In a small bowl, stir olive oil, honey, vanilla extract, cinnamon, and a pinch of salt, then toss with the oats and nuts until well coated.
3Bake granola: Spread into one layer on the baking sheet, then bake, stirring every 8 to 10 minutes, until golden brown (20 to 30 minutes total). Towards the end of the baking time, check your granola every few minutes to prevent it from over-browning (especially around the edges).
4Transfer to a cooling rack and let the granola cool completely. Store cooled granola in an airtight container for up to two weeks.
Adam and Joanne's Tips
- The nutrition facts provided below are estimates.
Lovely recipe as is all your other recipes eg. Almond butter tahini and humus thankyou kindly. It would really help if you could put your recipes on recipe mode
Wow, thank you very much for this simple and amazing recipe. I really appreciate. God bless you.
I doubled the recipe on 12” x 18” baking sheet, cut the amount of cinnamon by half and put the temperature at 340. Took about 24 minutes to cook.
Im a scientific cook! Meaning i like finding recipes and get a general idea of what to do then add my own things. I was needing a granola that included ingredients that would help lower cholesterol and assist with my chocolate cravings. So i added some raisins, and 100% cocoa powder, cashews, almonds, salted peanuts, honey,coconut oil and a little bit of water. OMGosh, very very delicious ended up with a chewy salty crunchy sweet granola that my kids prefer over candy! Thank you so much for this version it was helpful in me creating a wonderful snack that i feel good about eating and feeding to my children.
Could you share your granola recipe
I followed the directions and it was ready at 20 minutes, with only turning them twice. I used coconut oil instead of butter and it was really tasty, I would like them a bit crunchier, should I avoid the coconut oil? Very easy and very good.
When using butter, should it be clarified due to excess water in the butter?
Hi Jeff, we do not use clarified butter for this.
My son is a yogurt and granola freak and I am non-GMO freak so finding this simple recipe was awesome! We literally just finished making it and love it. Thanks!!
Hi. Tried it twice. Was yummmm!! But it kind of hardened after cooling.. was a jaw exercise to eat! So can u tell me.. at what “chewiness” should we remove it from the oven. Thanks.
Hi there, we remove the granola when it is light golden brown. It should be pretty crunchy.
Could olive oil be used in place of mentioned oils.
Hi Janet, Olive oil should be fine.
Very good recipe! I used chopped pecans and a small handful of sunflower seed (what I had on hand), and 1 tsp. vanilla. I have a new oven and cooking the granola at 300°F for 20 minutes worked perfectly. I loved it the way I made it, but I think it would still be good with a little more vanilla and or half the cinnamon. It is really a matter of personal taste like choosing which nuts to use, adding seeds or dried fruit. I prefer to let my kids make their own fruit choice on a per serving basis. Thanks for the awesome recipe!
After several years of store bought Granola. I stumbled upon this recipe and made it for the first time! I can only say, I’m already thinking about the next batch. Better than anything I’ve bought, EVER!!!! Thank you, thank you, thank you for this simple, easy treat!
Thank you for a great recipe! Mine were ready at 20mins, opening the oven twice to mix it. Ovens vary so it’s a good idea to check what your baking when your kitchen starts to smell heavenly. My kids and hubby ate half of it as soon as I took it out. We liked that it’s not very sweet and doesn’t hurt your gums to chew. I have some raw cocoa nibs so I added that too. Hope you’d post more recipes that are healthy and easy to do.
You are inconsistent about bake times, though I see that is somewhat addressed in the comments (looks like you reduced the bake time in the recipe, but not the story or the time summary). Mine, too, was burning at 20 minutes. Actually some started burning at 15, though it’s hard to tell since it’s already such a dark color. Also, you give a range of 20-30 min, but do not indicate how to tell when it is done.
Hopefully it’s fine once it cools…
Hi Marie, thanks for your comment. We just updated the post to be more clear. Thanks for letting us know we were not.
We didn’t really like this… Too much cinnamon and not very crunchy, though it was starting to burn
Bummer … sorry things didn’t work out for you.
Thank you so much for this delicious recipe! I love it…its the perfect amount of sweet. Not too sweet but not too bland. To lower the fat and to make it a little bit healthier…I replaced the butter with 2 tbsp applesauce and 1 tbsp coconut oil. and also only did 1/3 cup of nuts (which i mixed almonds and walnuts). It turned out wonderful! Blessings!
Thanks for sharing your adaptation. Love your idea to use applesauce!
I see comments where people subs the butter with coconut oil. I don’t see where it says use butter in the recipe.
Hi Sue, We call for olive oil, coconut oil, or butter in the recipe. It is up to you!
I made this granola this morning since I already had the ingredients on hand. The only thing I did not have were almonds. It turned out great though! I am definaly making this again in the future. Thank you so much for the recipe!
Looks yummy and super easy! Can’t wait to try making this with my daughter.
Mine burnt too! I will be trying again with a lower temp. used coconut oil and added in coconut flakes, chia, and flax. It tasted wonderful before baking, so I will definitely be trying again.
I literally just made this and it’s already a hit with my toddler! She was trying to eat it by the handful before it was even cooked lol. We used coconut oil, added in about 1T. Brown sugar and a handful of flaxseed. We didn’t have almonds, so I left those out. Delicious!
The temp is way too high for this and 25 minutes at 350 is too long. Mine burnt after 20 minutes.
I suggest lowering temp to 300 and cook for 35 – 40 minutes.
Just out of curiosity did anyone actually bake this for 35 minutes? My granola was in the oven for about 20 minutes & burned. I stirred it at 10 minutes. Went back to stir it again, & it was deep brown. Smelled yummy while it was cooking though. I’ll make this again with a time adjustment.
Hi Waverly, Sorry your granola became too brown – 35 minutes has worked for us, but ovens can vary. We have adjusted the recipe to accommodate. Thanks so much for coming back and sharing your experience.
Making this granola over the weekend. sounds yummy can’t wait. I make a peanut butter one that its so hard to stay out of. Looking forward to trying this.
i’ve been trying to be watch the fat/sugar in my diet, so i used splenda’s brown sugar blend mixed with water in the microwave to make it syrupy so i could avoid using fats and cut the sugar, then mixed the oats. i used almond extract instead of almonds to save some calories, then added the vanilla extract, cinnamon and a little maple syrup for a maple flavor. it turned out GREAT. thanks for the inspiration. got great taste AND low calories.
Hi Kate! Thanks so much for coming back and sharing your changes – We’re sure others will benefit from your comment. So happy you liked the granola!
Looks amazing and so easy to make! I need to try my hand at it soon! Thanks for the recipe!
Thanks, Julie! You should, plus I bet you could come up with a ton of fun additions 🙂
Homemade granola is the best!
We love it!