Thrifty food: ‘Left-overs’ muesli

Will you just take a moment to admire this superb-looking muesli? It’s actually a totally thrifty home-made recipe masterfully created from left-overs by Sydney-based blogger/chef/foodie/stylish girl about town The Likkle Girl Who Wurves Pwetty Things (hereafter known as Likkle Moola).

In an extremely kind and blush-worthy post, Likkle Moola explains that she was inspired by Oola Moola to clean out her pantry where she discovered “bits of grains, seeds, nuts and dried fruit left over from previous baking projects”. She used all the bits to make herself a huge batch of healthy, crunchy toasted muesli. We applaud her “make do” efforts. (And we also applaud the inclusion of peanut butter in her recipe.) Luckily, she was kind enough to share it with us. Take it away, Likkle Moola …

To make your own, you’ll need:
~ 200g nuts (make up that amount from what’s left in your larder - I used a mix of macadamias, slivered almonds and pepitas)
~ 250g rolled oats
~ 100g bran
~ 50g shredded coconut
~ 150g dried fruit (again, use what you have - I threw in sultanas and dried cranberries)

~ 100g vegetable oil
~ 50g peanut butter
~ 150g honey

• Preheat oven to 150°C.
• Place all dry ingredients (except dried fruit) into a big bowl.
• Add oil, peanut butter and honey. Mix well.
• Line two large baking trays with greaseproof paper. Divide mix evenly onto trays. Spread mix out as thinly as possible to ensure even cooking.
• Place trays into preheated oven and bake for 15 minutes.
• Pull trays out and give muesli a good stir and spread it out thinly again so all the bits get a chance to brown.
• Place trays back in oven and repeat the stirring and spreading every 10 minutes until the muesli is golden.
• Oh, remember to mix in the dried fruit in the last 10 minutes, when you think the muesli is nearly done as the fruit burns easily.
• Leave to cool completely and store in airtight container.

There, done and can be kept for at least a month, if stored correctly (but I think it’ll be eaten way before that!). What I like most about making my own muesli is I can choose what I want to put in - there’s always at least one ingredient in store-bought ones that I don’t like and have to pick out before eating.

Total spent: AU$0.00 (had everything in the pantry)
Cost of a 1kg bag of our usual macadamia muesli: AU$19.oo
Savings: AU$19.00