Savoury Granola

Breakfast can lay claim to the title of most important meal of the day all it wants, but lunch and dinner aren’t going down without a fight. The pair first stole breakfast’s literal meal ticket with the delicious movement to put an egg on everything — and hot on the heels of that success, lunch and dinner are now coming for granola. If a fried egg can go on pizza or pasta, so too can granola, tweaked with salt and chilis in place of all the sugar and baking spices. Just like a runny egg, savoury versions of granola almost always make a dish better.

Classic granola is a staple of the morning meal for good reason. Sweet oats, nuts and seeds undoubtedly make the perfect crunchy and nutritious complement to tangy yogurt. But yogurt isn’t the only thing that benefits from a touch of added taste and texture — and granola is a phenomenal flavour vehicle. Nuts and croutons are commonplace in salads, but granola laced with umami-rich ingredients such as olives, nori and soy can work even better. A silky squash soup does a nice job of warding off the winter’s cold on its own, but the spicy Aleppo pepper and fragrant coriander seeds of dukkah-flavoured granola take it to another level.

Hippies, hikers and healthy eaters (those same people who consider breakfast the most important meal) also celebrate sweet granola as a healthy snack that’s full of nutritious nuts and seeds and isn’t fried like potato chips. But when you’re craving chips, a bag of sweet oats is a tough sell. Spicy Sichuan granola with tongue-tingling peppercorns makes a snack even the most adventurous eaters enjoy. And barbecue granola with whole spices that mimic the elements of a dry rub for ribs packs more flavour in a handful than the entire grocery store chip aisle combined.

Top chefs in Toronto and beyond have long recognized the value of taking granola for a walk on the savoury side. Restaurants such as Dandylion on Queen Street West in Toronto, as well as State Bird Provisions in San Francisco and Eleven Madison Park in New York have used savoury granolas for years to add flavour and texture to dishes and it’s easy to follow their lead at home.

Our favourite recipes follow, but we also fully endorse experimenting with other spice combinations to complement a specific dish or to create your own signature snack blend.