Tropical Granola

I love making homemade granola -- it takes less than an hour including baking and its a lot cheaper and healthier than buying granola at the grocery store. I wanted to change my usual granola a little bit to make a bit more summery, so I came up with this tropical granola. Including the mashed banana really gives this a ton of flavor. Adding the egg white, helps the granola form clumps. Feel free to switch out the dried fruits for whatever you like, banana chips, papaya, or mango would also work great in this granola. This granola is great on its own or served over yogurt.

Tropical Granola

1 large very ripe banana, mashed
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
1/4 cup honey
1 T canola oil
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp salt
2/3 cup shredded coconut
2/3 cup dried cranberries
1 cup dried apricots, chopped
1 cup dried pineapple, chopped
4 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
1/2 cup ground flax seed
1 cup chopped pecans
1 egg white

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Line 2 large baking sheets with Silpats or parchment paper. Combine banana, applesauce, honey, oil, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and salt and whisk together until smooth in a large bowl. Add remaining ingredients and stir gently with a wooden spoon until well incorporated. The mixture will be dry but all dry ingredients should be moistened. Beat egg white with a whisk until foamy and pour over mixture. Stir to incorporate.

Spread in an even layer onto prepared pans, if mixture is too deep, it may take longer to bake. Bake about 30 minutes, stir gently making sure to move the granola from the edges into the middle and bake about 20 minutes more. Remove from oven and cool on pans. Transfer to storage containers. Recipe yields about 3 quart-size jars of granola.