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Why granola even if organic is not a healthy choice nutritionally or for the gut microbiome. Making your own is not even a healthy choice!
Is granola healthy to eat? Are brands from the store that are organic and/or sprouted acceptable?
What about homemade granola?
Sadly, the answer to all three of these questions is a resounding NO!
Even so-called “traditional granola” recipes, where soaked organic oats (or sprouted) are used before toasting in the oven, are not in the least bit digestible.
While soaking or sprouting oats before making granola is a big improvement, the fact is that digestive damage is still going to occur if you eat it. This preparation method is not traditional in the slightest.
Many granola fans do not seem to know that oats, even if sprouted or soaked first, are still not properly prepared in a traditional manner.
Thus, the proteins in the oats remain in a form that is extremely difficult to break down in the digestive tract.
Difficult-to-digest food that is not metabolized completely leaves undigested residues in the gut that cause pathogens to thrive.
This is why some people “crave” granola…it’s an addictive food like sugar that feeds gut pathogens.
Over time, pathogen overgrowth in the gut leads to a disrupted microbiome and eventually digestive symptoms.
The high potential of improperly prepared grains to harm health…with granola being perhaps the most prominent modern example…is why traditional societies took such great pains to soak, sprout, or ferment (sour leaven) them.
Here’s the last piece many folks seem to miss…
Not only did traditional peoples soak, sprout, or sour leaven their grains. They also thoroughly cooked them as the final preparation step before eating!
In other words, toasting sprouted or soaked oats in the oven does not fully deactivate the anti-nutrients.
Let’s explore this important precept of traditional diet in more detail below.
Why Granola is SO Difficult to Digest
The dry heat of an oven at the proper toasting temperature is simply not hot enough to complete the breakdown of anti-nutrients in oats or other grains.
Thus, even homemade granola is extremely difficult to digest. Eaten often, it can damage the gut over time.
Perhaps if a person has an iron gut, then homemade granola that is soaked or sprouted but not fully cooked might work on occasion.
The reality is that most people have sensitive guts today. This is a generational decline in health that is the result of several generations of children raised on antibiotics and processed foods.
Most people have some sort of digestive sensitivity to grains, even if there are no grain allergy symptoms present.
I know for me, I bloat terribly if I eat homemade granola that has been soaked or sprouted and then toasted.
Interestingly, thoroughly cooked unsoaked oatmeal digests far better.
The lesson to me is that the final cooking step for sprouted grains is very important!
Healthy Alternatives
The good news is that when you ditch granola, there are other options to consider that are very tasty and no more difficult to prepare.
In my home, I make these healthy breakfast cereal recipes instead of granola. Several of them provide that lovely crunch that is so yummy in milk for breakfast.
Another alternative is to make grain free granola that uses soaked nuts, fruits, and soaked seeds instead of grains as the primary ingredient.
Sources and More Information
Nourishing Traditions, p. 454
Hi would it work with organic white rice flour … I have an issue with oxalates (12mm kidney stone) so it is the only grain I can have … it would be lovely to make ‘cereal’ – thank you for the fab posting <3
Hi would it work with organic white rice flour … I have an issue with oxalates (12mm kidney stone) so it is the only grain I can have … it would be lovely to make ‘cereal’ – thank you for the fab posting <3
Hello Sarah
So happy to find you thru Weston Price. I believe there is one exception to the precooking rule and hope you can clarify this. In Sally Fallon’s book she has a cold Middle Eastern cereal “Kishk” that is soaked and then directly baked at low heat without a high temp cooking step. Please advise.
I made the cereal and found it too hard to chew. I am trying a second batch and lowering the temp on my oven to the very lowest it will go. I think my oven is very powerful and was too high for the cereal.
Hi Renee, you are right about that. I’ve made it before a very long time ago and it was too hard. I’ve had good results with the homemade cold cereal recipe posted on this blog though although you have to be careful of that one getting too hard too if you overdry. I would think that kishk would follow the same principle that it would be for those with iron stomachs only. Perhaps the fact that it is fermented would break the grain proteins down a bit better than soaking or sprouting.
Another thought Renee … bulgur flour is sprouted so perhaps using sprouted flour then fermenting which is how you make kishk helps considerably. Also, kishk is made out of flour .. not the unground grain as with oat based granola which makes breakdown so much more difficult due to the large pieces of grain involved.
oh no- my partner (who’s mostly pretty supportive of the food choices I make for our family) & I disagree over cereal. The recent compromise was that he could make granola for the kids, so as to have a healthy, ready-to-serve option on some mornings. I think I may just tuck this info away & share it with him in a few months. They don’t eat it often anyway.
Might be more appropriately used as a small topping/condiment, sprinkled on top of yogurt, etc.
Fully cooked oatmeal that has been soaked overnight is fine of course.
I rarely make granola anymore, but I wonder if you made oatmeal by cooking it, then adding your fat and sweetener, then drying it out in the oven and crumbling it?
for those who have not tried it, i would give Emmer wheat (Zea) a go. Being the most ancient and easily digestible food of the Gods n’ all, before big business introduced us with all the wrong grains for us, in favour of profit.
What about oatmeal?
Very informative post. I have given up all grains myself, but since my kids won’t it’s nice to know how to make it better for them.