Chili Garlic Crackers

I like savory bakes and am always looking out for new recipes. When I came across Champa’s chili garlic crackers, I bookmarked the recipe. These crackers are prepared with pie crust dough. The dough is spiced with chilies and garlic. I followed the recipe as given. The crackers were spicy and make a nice tea time or a cocktail snack.

I made these crackers twice. First time I made the crackers, the first day I tasted them, I was not sure I liked the taste. The more I ate, the more I started liking. The main reason for this is I rolled the crackers a little too thin. Rather, all the crackers were not of the same thickness and some crackers were slightly burnt. The crackers that were not burnt tasted good. The pictures are from the first try and you can see the crackers are light golden brown in color. The second time I planned to bake these cookies for a friend I was going to meet the next day. I wanted another taste tester to approve the the crackers. Unfortunately we had to cancel our plan due to weather conditions. Second time I made sure all the crackers were of uniform thickness. This time all the crackers were evenly backed and tasted good. Even without a second taste tester I approved the crackers to go on the blog. I was too lazy to take the pictures the second time I baked the crackers.

Source: Versatile Kitchen
Total Time: 25 minutes + 3 hours to up to overnight of chilling the dough
Preparation: 10 minutes
Bake Time: 15 minutes
Yields: 12 - 14 (depends on the thickness. First time I got 14 and second time 12 crackers)

Ingredients:

1 ¼ cup All Purpose Flour
2 tsp. Sugar
½ tsp. Baking Powder
¼ tsp. + ⅛ tsp. Salt
4-5 small Green Chilies (I used 4)
2 Garlic Pods
3 tbsp. Butter, cold and cut into few pieces
2 tbsp. Oil (I used olive oil but canola can also be used)
2-3 tbsp. Water, cold (start with 2 tablespoon and add the last tablespoon if required. I used only 2 tbsp.)

Preparation:

Take flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, green chilies and garlic pods into a food processor with chopping blade and pulse until chilies and garlic are minced evenly.
Add butter, oil and pulse until incorporated and butter is cut into tiny flakes.
Add water and pulse until crumbly dough is formed. One should be able to make a ball of the dough, but not very smooth one though.
Transfer the dough to a bowl, make a thick flat disc, cover with saran wrap and refrigerate for 3 hours or overnight. First time I made the crackers I refrigerated for about 6 hours and the second time since I dropped my plan to meet my friend, I ended up refrigerating the dough for almost 36 - 40 hours.
Take out the dough from the fridge and let it sit for 5 minutes. I found that letting it sit for about 10 minutes was easier to work with.
Adjust oven racks to lower most and middle level racks. Preheat the oven to 350 F.
Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
On a lightly floured surface roll out the dough to ⅛” thick discs. I divided the dough into 2 portions and then rolled it out. It was easier this way. The edges of the rolled dough might not be even and smooth. That is ok. The dough might also fall apart and crack when rolling, just patch the dough together and roll it out.
Using a cookie cutter or biscuit cutter cut the rolled out dough into smaller discs. Or the rolled dough can be cut into squares or rectangles using a knife.
Using a fork uniformly pierce the crackers.
Collect the scrapes and roll it out again, repeating the above step.
Carefully transfer the crackers to prepared baking sheet.
Bake in the lowest rack for 12 minutes, transfer to middle rack and bake for another 3 minutes. Baking time depends on how big and thick the crackers are.
Cool the crackers on a wire rack and store in an airtight container.

Suggestions:

Crackers can be flavored with different herbs. For cheese crackers add ½ parmesan cheese when making the dough.
Crackers have a garlic flavor and if is not fond of garlic, leave it out and use any spice or herb of preference.

This day in 2011: Tomato Soup
This day in 2014: Chickenn Xacuti from Goa