Crunchy Baked Breakfast Granola with Pumpkin Seeds

Easy Homemade Granola

Granola is undoubtedly delicious, but did you know that it’s also easy to make and SO much cheaper than buying store-bought? Truly. With two mixing bowls and a sheet pan, you can easily make this granola at home in about 10 minutes of prep time.

Granola is a regular staple on my breakfast menu. I like to keep simple versions on hand in my pantry, like a nut-free brown sugar granola or a simple maple syrup-sweetened granola. While they are both delicious paired with Greek yogurt and fresh fruit, sometimes I just need to mix it up a bit.

That’s where this more complex breakfast granola comes into play. Like my maple hazelnut granola, this granola still uses egg whites to help create those chunky, crunchy clusters with less sugar, but it also calls for pecans, chia seeds, and nutty pumpkin seeds. Add in a dash of sweetness from the maple syrup and a bit of pumpkin spice blend, and this baked breakfast granola becomes perfect for fall mornings.

What You’ll Need

This delicious baked breakfast granola recipe calls for eleven ingredients, some of which may be pantry staples in your kitchen. The pumpkin seeds in this granola have a nutty, earthy flavor with both salty and sweet undertones that play really nicely with the pecans. When baked, both take on a crunchier texture while their flavor adds a rich, toasted nuance with a hint of bitterness.

How to Make Breakfast Granola

Homemade granola is a quick and easy recipe. You’ll spend far longer waiting for it to bake and cool than preparing the recipe!

• Prepare the baking sheet. Preheat the oven to 300ºF and line a baking sheet with parchment paper or grease it with a thin coating of butter.

A Note on Pumpkin Spice

From muffins and donuts to lattes, pumpkin spice can be found in many dishes, especially during the fall season. The first thing you should know about it is that it does not contain pumpkins. Simplified, pumpkin spice is a spice blend made for pumpkin and can be used as a stand-alone seasoning for desserts like pumpkin pie.

Often made from a simple combination of spices like cinnamon, ginger, and allspice, pumpkin pie spice complements the flavors of pumpkin. You can buy it whenever you purchase spices, sometimes under the name pumpkin pie spice, but it’s so easy to make your own at home. 

How To Make Pumpkin Pie Spice 

The best part about making your own pumpkin spice blend is that you can adjust the spices to suit your tastes. I personally love cardamom, so I like my pumpkin spice blend to include more or that than you would find in a common grocery store blend. Here’s my favorite pumpkin spice recipe:

• 1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1 ½ teaspoons cardamom
• ½ teaspoon allspice
• ½ teaspoon cloves
• ½ teaspoon nutmeg

Measure all the ingredients into a small jar with a tight-fitting lid, and shake well to combine. Store leftover pumpkin spice with your other spices. 

Tips for Success

As with every recipe, there are always tips to help you get it right on the first try and every try. To get make perfectly crunchy pumpkin granola, keep these things in mind.

• Don’t use hot butter. Melt it, then let it cool before adding it, or it could cook the egg whites in the granola.
• Don’t overcook the granola! It should be golden brown, with slightly more color around the edges than in the middle. When you pull it from the oven, it won’t be crunchy. If you try to bake it until it’s crunchy, it will burn.
• Let it cool before breaking up. It’s tempting to dig in as soon as it comes out of the oven, but resist! Hot granola must cool completely while still on the baking sheet, and it will get crunchy. Trust me! Be patient and let it cool undisturbed.

Serving Suggestions

There are a variety of ways to enjoy this crunchy breakfast granola with pumpkin seeds. Like most granolas, you can serve it with seasonal fruit for a yogurt parfait or with milk. Highlighting the flavors of fall, this pumpkin spice granola would be especially good sprinkled over baked pears with salted caramel ice cream or as a topping on banana bread muffins. As always, you can take it along as an on-the-go snack.

How to Store

One of my favorite things about this baked granola with pumpkin seeds is how long it lasts! Stored in an airtight container, homemade granola will last for weeks on the counter or in the pantry, similar to the lifespan of store-bought cereals. I like to store mine in a glass jar or one of the OXO pop-up containers.