Fruit and Nut Crisps! The PERFECT cracker for cheese!

Nothing is more perfectly paired than cheese and crackers, but sometimes you want to feel fancy so you get those delicious fruit crisp crackers from the store, but they are super expensive in terms of crackers pricing, so if you’re me, you only buy them when you are feeling fancy and having guests over. Instead of buying them, we can make them! These crisp crackers aren’t too tricky to make, but they do take a few hours because you need to let things cool and do a second bake. Feel free to switch up the flavours, you can use any nuts, dried fruit and spices you have on hand. You can even switch up the flour if you have some fun flours like whole wheat or rye flour, feel free to substitute 50% of the flour with that. Lots of fun flavours you can make!

Snazzy Crackers!

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Fruit and Nut Crisps

Yield: about 50 crackers depending on how you slice them

Preheat oven to 350*F for the first bake, 250*F for the second bake

• 1 cup of Flour

• 1/4 cup Brown Sugar

• 1 teaspoon Baking Soda

• 1/2 cup Oats

• 1/2 teaspoon Salt

• 1/2 teaspoon Pepper

• 2-3 teaspoons herbs and spices, I did 1/2 teaspoon each: cinnamon, dried rosemary, dried thyme, and paprika but do whatever your heart desires!

• 1/2 cup seeds/nuts (I used 1/2 cup sliced almonds)

• 1/2 dried fruit (I used 1/2 cup dried cranberries)

• 1 cup Milk

• 1/4 cup Sour Cream (you can also use yogurt, buttermilk, or even unsweetened apple sauce or pumpkin puree)

1. In a large bowl stir together your dry ingredients, flour, brown sugar, baking soda, oats, salt, pepper, and herbs/spices. Toss to combine.

2. Stir in your dried fruit and nuts.

3. Pour in your milk and sour cream, stir to combine.

4. Pour into a greased and lined loaf pan, I used an 8”x4” pan.

5. Bake in a preheated 350*F oven for about 35-45 minutes or until a toothpick stabbed into it comes out clean.

6. Let cool at room temperature, then freeze for 1-2 hours.

7. Once lightly frozen, slice your loaf as thinly as possible using a serrated knife.

8. Lay each slice in a single layer on lined baking trays.

9. Bake in a preheated 250*F oven for 35-50 minutes or until thoroughly dried out. We are not baking at this point so much as we are drying out the crackers.

10. Let cool and eat! These babies can be stored in a sealed container at room temperature.

Cheese Crackers!

Who doesn’t love cheese crackers, a favourite since the days of eating handfuls of goldfish crackers on the playground! These delicious cheesy crackers can be modified to incorporate whatever grate-able cheese you have in the fridge, which results in SO many fun flavours! I went with cheddar and parmesan because that’s what I had on hand, and as we know, it’s quarantine so I am avoiding the store.

Little cheese bites!

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Cheese Crackers

Yield: depends on how you cut them, lets say about 100 small crackers!

Preheat your oven to 350*F

• 1/2 cup Flour

• 1 teaspoon Sugar

• 1/2 teaspoon Salt

• 1/4 teaspoon Baking Powder

• 1/4 teaspoon Smoked Paprika (you can leave this out or replace it with other spices, things like onion or garlic powder, italian seasoning, cajun seasoning, even rosemary or thyme would be good!)

• 2 Tablespoons Cold Butter, cubed

• about 115g Cheddar Cheese, grated on the smallest sized grater you have (you can replace this with another cheese such as swiss, mozzarella, havarti, whatever you got!)

• 2 Tablespoons grated parmesan (optional)

• 1-2 Tablespoons of cold milk or water

• Coarse salt for the tops

1. In a bowl combine all your dry ingredients - flour, sugar, salt, baking powder and smoked paprika (or other spices)

2. Toss in your cold butter and cheese and combine together by pinching and rubbing the dough with your hands until it looks like coarse sand. We ideally want there to be no large butter chunks left but it still looks crumbly.

3. Now add your milk (or water) a little bit at a time, I used about 1.5 Tablespoons, but it will vary depending on how dry your cheese is, something like an old cheddar or a parmesan is going to need a little more moisture, while something like a havarti is not as dry and will need a little less. So just add a little bit at a time, stirring them together until you can grab a ball in your hand and when squeezed it will stay in a ball.

4. Press the dough together into a disk and wrap with saran wrap and chill for at least 30 minutes.

5. Roll out your dough onto a lightly floured surface and cut into small squares using a pizza cutter, or whatever shape you like!

6. Bake in a preheated 350*F oven for about 10-15 minutes or until lightly golden on the bottom and cheese-y smelling!

7. Let cool and eat! Store any extras in an airtight container or baggie.

These cheese-y crackers taste like the crispy bits from a grilled cheese sandwich! So delicious! Plus you can switch up the types of cheese and spice for end...

Lavash Crackers

What’s better than cheese and crackers…cheese and HOMEMADE crackers! Lavash crackers are a super thin flatbread that you can top with any type of spices and seeds to customize to your liking. They look beautiful on a cheese board as you can break them into large pieces that you can place in a glass for added height.

Crunchy Crackers!

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Lavash Crackers

Yield: about a 15”x10” rectangle

Preheat oven to 400*F when you are shaping the dough.

Dough:

• 3/4 cup Flour

• 1/4 teaspoon instant Yeast

• 1/3 cup water, warm

• 1 teaspoon Honey

• 1/2 teaspoon Salt

Topping:

Olive oil and seasoning of your choice - I used a pre made spice blend normally used for steak, but whatever you like is great! Or you can just use coarse salt.

1. In the bowl of your mixer combine all the ingredients for the dough.

2. Mix with the dough hook on your mixer for about 10 minutes, or until a non-sticky dough ball forms.

3. Place your dough ball into a grease bowl with a lid for about 1-2 hours at room temperature.

4. Once your dough has rested roll it out as thin as you can with a rolling pin, then place on the BOTTOM side of a baking tray that you have greased and use your hands and rolling pin to stretch and pull the dough as thin as you can.

5. Drizzle your dough with a little olive oil and smear it over the dough so it is fully covered.

6. Sprinkle the dough with your seasonings.

7. Bake in the preheated 400*F oven for 5-10 minutes, keep an eye on these as they can go from unbaked to burnt very quickly, I check the crackers every minute or two. My crackers took 9.5 minutes. The dough will be crispy and golden, thinner pieces will be a bit darker but that is fine.

8. Let your crackers cool for at least 10 minutes before cracking into pieces and eating!

It's crackers! No box required!