TWD: Baking with Julia - Savory Wheat Crackers

Crackers!  We made Savory Wheat Crackers this week for our Tuesday's with Dorie group.  They are actually really simple to put together, though of course I waited until the last minute to get it done...  Story of my life these days!  We actually eat a lot of crackers in my house, so I was excited to give these a try.  The clever baby loves crackers - I think it is the crunch.  He gets to use those sharp little teeth on something appropriate (i.e. food) instead of everything else he decides to try chewing on, like my collarbones, a shoelace, dog toys, paper, you name it!  Ahhh, teething.  So, I say, "bring on the crackers" so he can give those little teeth a workout! 

I did change the recipe a tad bit... First, I cut it down a LOT.  The recipe yields 12 dozen.  And while, yes, we love crackers around here, I really don't relish the thought of making 12 dozen of them!  That's a crazy amount of crackers!  So I made 1/3 of the recipe - the most logical reduction for me with ingredient amounts.  Also, the recipe called for some seeds that I don't generally have on hand - anise seeds and nigella seeds (I don't actually even know what nigella seeds are!!) and I didn't feel like finding and buying them so that I could use a teensy weensy bit, like less than 1/4 teaspoon!  The seeds are simply sprinkled on top, so I substituted pumpkin seeds and sesame seeds.  I also ended up baking the crackers for much longer then specified.  The recipe states that they cook for 2 1/2 to 3 minutes.  Mine, after that amount of time, were not at all crisp.  And they didn't crisp up when they were out of the oven, either.  Limp crackers are no good!  So I cooked the next batch for more like 4 1/2 minutes and they actually crisped up nicely!  It is amazing how the limp, blah cracker became so great!  The crisp texture really helped the flavor - it is probably a brain thing, but really, crackers should go "crack" when you bite them, right? 

All in all, these are good crackers, from an easy recipe to adjust to your own liking.  Will I make them again??  We'll see.  They'd be great at a dinner party with some specialty cheese or something, I think.  You could flavor them a zillion different ways, so they are certainly versatile!

You can find the recipe for Savory Wheat Crackers on pages 163-164 of Baking with Julia, or by following this link.  I would bet that my fellow TWD bakers have come up with all sorts of interesting combinations for these crackers, so to check out some of those blogs, see the list here.