Concrete crackers

Between the time I first tried them, say, in 2003?, and recently, they seem to have gotten more roof tile like. Or - it could be my perception. I figure I can throw seeds and cheese in or on the Bitten (or other recipes..).

Meantime, thinking I liked them, I ordered a whole bunch from Amazon. I'm wending my way through them.

So today I made some flatbread/sort of soft crackers that I think are wonderful.

From the Rubber Slippers in Italy blog - Pizza Secca ai Cereali (multi-grain flatbread):

see link for photos- http://rubbahslippahsinitaly.blogspot.com/2007/10/world-bread-day-07-pizza-secca-ai.html

There's more description leading up to the recipe, including putting the flatbread on a grill for a bit - which I didn't do (and there's much more to look at in the blog, which I like a lot)

Recipe
3 tablespoons uncooked farro or multi-grain cereal mix
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup wholewheat flour
1½ teaspoons salt
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
2 tablespoons hulled sunflower seeds (I used pumpkin seeds)
2 tablespoons white sesame seeds (I used toasted wt. sesame seeds)
1½ teaspoons quick-rising yeast
4 tablespoons olive oil (I used olive oil that had been in a jar with some sliced jalapenos in it)
8 tablespoons warm water

Parentheses/osso -
1. Bring a small pot of water to a boil and cook farro or cereal grains for about 30 minutes until al dente. Drain and set aside to cool. (I did this the day before)
2. Combine the two flours, salt, sugar, sunflower and sesame seeds in a large bowl. Make a well in the center and add the cooked cereal grains, olive oil and water. Sprinkle the yeast over the water, allowing it to dissolve in the liquid.
3. Using your hands or a sturdy wooden spoon, mix everything until it comes together. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead steadily for 10 minutes to develop the gluten. Lightly oil the exterior of your dough and place into a clean bowl. Cover with plastic wrap or a kitchen towel and set in a warm place to rise until doubled, 1½ to 2 hours.
4. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Roll dough into a 14½ x 8½ inch rectangle and place on a parchment-lined sheet. Let rest for 20 minutes then lightly dimple with your fingertips and drizzle olive oil over the top (I didn't drizzle oil). If desired, sprinkle with fleur de sel. Bake for 15-18 minutes until golden brown on the undersides. Makes 8 slices. (Well, I got more smaller slices.)

Osso - this is a wet dough. I don't use a dough mixer, but it's easy enough to knead a wet dough if you know your hands are going to be wet and sticky, and you learn to use a dough scraper. Scape, fold, punch, scrape, fold, punch, and so on. I did it for maybe eight minutes, which I found to be plenty.

This turned out delicious.

I'm going to try this again today or tomorrow, adjusting the flours a bit. Which isn't to say I don't like the Rubber Slippers recipe, I do, a lot, delicious. Upon googling, I see there are a lot of flatbread sites out there, but I like this one blog, as it happens.

Anyway, my plan is to slightly adjust the flour ratio, and also substitute ground flax seed for a bit of the flour. I don't want to add a big amount of that the first time I try it, in case I don't like the taste. An alternative I could do is cut into a flax seed oil capsule and sub for some of the olive oil, but I don't have those, only fish oil capsules, and that would be another cracker..


So, in this case:

3 tablespoons multi-grain cereal mix, per the instructions above (have never seen farro in the store)
1 cup all-purpose flour 1 1/4 c unbleached flour
1 cup wholewheat flour 5/8 c whole wheat flour
1/8 c ground flax seed
1½ teaspoons salt
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
2 tablespoons hulled sunflower seeds (I used pumpkin seeds, salted, but I like salt)
2 tablespoons white sesame seeds (I used toasted wt. sesame seeds)
1½ teaspoons quick-rising yeast
4 tablespoons olive oil (I used olive oil that had been in a jar with some sliced jalapenos in it)
8 tablespoons warm water

Will report back.

http://thecafesucrefarine.blogspot.com/2011/09/olive-oil-crackers-with-sea-salt-and.html

Glad you revived this, Beth, and those look both easy and good.