No Oil Seed Crackers

Gluten-Free and Vegan, these seed crackers are made without added oil. Chickpea flour adds protein.

Healthy snacking is possible. These little crackers are packed with seeds and flavour. Sturdy little bites that work so perfectly with your favourite hummus.

These seed crackers are vegan and gluten-free. But you can use regular white flour if gluten-free is not important to you. I've used a gluten-free 1:1 flour for part of the flour required. All-purpose is a simple substitute.

Oat flour and chickpea flour are both gluten-free. These flours add texture and flavour. But I would hate for you not to try to make these no-oil crackers because you don't have the right kinds of flour on hand. The chickpea flour makes for a denser cracker. If you use all wheat flour (and skip the oat and chickpea flour altogether), you will find the crackers are lighter. But the recipe works the same. Although, I have noticed that when using all-purpose flour exclusively, the crackers stale faster.

The dough needs a good kneading before it is rolled out to form crackers. Roll as flat and evenly as possible. Thin spots will brown faster and the crackers will cook unevenly.

You can see that I did not bother making perfect squares with my dough. I kinda like the way they look like this.

If using pumpkin seeds, you might need to push some back into the rolled out dough so that they stay in place. The pumpkin seeds might fall out a bit when you roll out the dough.

These seed crackers are made with no added oil. I've used a bit of tahini for moisture and fat, but no additional oil. And despite the minimal amount of fat, these crackers are still crisp.

Notes about No-Oil Seed Crackers

• You can mix up the flours used in this recipe, based on what you have on hand. Just keep the total quantity the same.
• If you don't have gluten-free flour, use all-purpose white or whole wheat flour in its place.
• In fact, this recipe works just as well with all all-purpose flour if you don't have any of the speciality flours on hand. (I actually use half whole wheat and half white).
• I haven't tried the recipe with only gluten-free baking blend, so I can't speak the results you might get. I've also used a gluten-free blend along with chickpea and oat.
• Chickpea flour has a distinct and strong flavour. I find it very savoury and it works well with the salty seeds in this recipe. But I prefer not to over do it. So I think you should use no more than 1/2 cup.
• For the seeds, I like sesame, hemp and pumpkin. But feel free to try sunflower, some sliced almonds or just stick to all sesame.
• Crackers will keep for about a week in an air-type container. BUT make sure they are fully dried and cooled before packing them away. Any extra moisture and they will go stale very quickly.
• I like to dust the top of crackers with a pinch of flaky sea salt when they come out of the oven. You might want to press it into the crackers a bit, do this quickly while they are still hot from the oven.

Bake the crackers until they are golden brown. They will feel dry to the touch. Sprinkle with salt as soon as they come out of the oven. Let them cool completely before you pack them away.