raw curry and flax crackers

August 9, 2011

I am really like a little kid when I get a new toy. While I used to be excited about hula hoops (okay, that’s a lie because I couldn’t hula hoop), American Girl Dolls, and skip-its, times have changed. Although the Husband might still wish I could get excited about getting a package of Silly Bandz because they’re only $1.00 at the gas station. Instead, I make him get me a $3.00 Smart Water and cleanse my palette to let him know my taste has matured.

Now my new toys include things such as food processors, pictures to hang in my bathroom, and food dehydrators.

YES! I said a food dehydrator! I know, I squealed a little too. Luckily I’m not like Charlie or else I would have peed a little. However, that is neither here nor there, and I’m pretty sure I’m not making my crackers seem appealing with that being said.

Or maybe I am – aren’t they beautiful?

Yeah, I thought so too.

While I will get into the specifics of my food dehydrator in another post, I have to say that preparing raw food is by far one of the easiest things I have ever done in my life. I love how quick and relatively simple recipes/processes are to make delicious treats.

If you don’t know too much about raw foods prepared in a dehydrator, what happens is the food is not heated above a certain temperature, and basically sucks all the water/moisture out of the food. Just like going to bed at 10:30 sucks the life out of me when I get up at 4:30. True story.

When food isn’t heated above a particular temperature, the food isn’t considered “cooked” and all the nutrients are preserved, as opposed to when they are heated up in an oven or microwave.

Pretty cool, eh?

Now that I have officially made myself feel like a Minnesotan (is that a word?), let’s move onto the food. Because that is in fact what you come here for – that or my incredibly witty banter. I’m going to go with the latter, but the former sounds pretty good as well.

One of the first things I made in my dehydrator was flax crackers. I studied a few recipes online only to find that it is basically seamless and pretty darn easy. Believe me, if I failed to screw it up, you certainly won’t. I’m kind of a disaster in the kitchen lately, remember?

I’ll be honest – I created and made this recipe, and when they came out of the dehydrator, I thought “meh, the flax aftertaste is a little much for my liking”. When a co-worker also thought the same thing, I decided there was only one thing to do – and that was not to throw them all away.

Bring out the curry powder party.

Raw Curry and Flax Crackers (makes a LOT of crackers)

2 cups whole flax seeds
1 cup ground flax
water
1/3 cup lemon juice
1/2 cup nutritional yeast
1 tbsp. garlic powder
1 tbsp. bragg’s
curry powder (enough to coat the crackers once dehydrated)

Directions: Begin by pouring your 2 cups whole flax seeds in a large bowl. Carefully pour enough cold water into the bowl so the flax seeds are just covered. It will seem like more water than you need, but I promise it will be okay. Let the flax seeds soak for 10-15 minutes. The seeds should “gel” and start to stick together. Once the flax has gelled, add your ground flax, lemon juice, nutritional yeast, and other spices (minus the curry powder). You can let this mixture sit for a few minutes to congeal together.

Turn your dehydrator to 115 degrees Fahrenheit. Spread 1.5 cups of the cracker batter onto dehydrator sheets (I had about 3.5 full sheets of cracker batter) and dehydrate for 6-12 hours. Halfway through, flip your crackers over. Your crackers will be done when they reach your desired consistency (i like really crunchy!). Break cracker sheets apart with your hands to create bite sized pieces. Place in a large plastic bag and coat with curry powder. Close and shake bag until all pieces are coated with the spice.

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