These delightful crackers are full of flavor with an addictive texture that will keep you crunching. Additionally, they are nutrient-packed and suitable for gluten-free, paleo, and low-carb eaters.
Course Appetizer, Meal Prep, Salad, Side Dish, Sides, Snack
Cuisine American, California, Vegan, Vegetarian
Keyword Addictive, Crunchy, flavorful
Prep Time 20minutes
Cook Time 6hours
Soaking & inactive (oven off) 9hours30minutes
Total Time 15hours50minutes
Servings 10servings of 6 crackers; makes 60 crackers
⅔cupred bell pepper chopped (½ - ¾ of a red bell pepper)
¾teaspoonsea saltomit or reduce to ¼ teaspoon if using full sodium tamari or soy sauce
⅓cupgrated carrots
⅓cupsliced scallions
Instructions
Soak
Cut sun-dried tomatoes using a knife or cooking shears/scissors into small 1/4" or smaller pieces. Then combine in a small bowl with 2 ⅔ cups hot tap water. Soak for 30 minutes.
Drain the sun-dried tomatoes using a fine strainer. Push on the sun-dried tomato pieces with a spoon or spatula to get all of the water out. Reserve all soaking liquid from sun-dried tomatoes. Remove 3/4 cup from the soaking liquid and put it in the food processor with the garlic, parsley, rosemary, lemon juice, low sodium tamari, red bell pepper, and salt.
Take the rest of the soaking liquid from the sun-dried tomatoes and mix it with the flaxseeds in a medium to large bowl. The flaxseeds will sit for 60 minutes. You don't need to drain the flax seeds, they will gel up in the sun-dried tomato liquid.
Food Processor or Blender
Process the 3/4 cup soaking liquid from the sun-dried tomatoes, garlic, chopped fresh parsley, minced fresh rosemary, lemon juice, low sodium tamari, red bell pepper, and salt in the processor until well-blended. There will be small bits of herbs and veggies in the fragrant liquid. Pour this liquid into the bowl of soaking flaxseeds. Wait to stir.
Grate the carrot and slice the scallions, then place them and the drained sun-dried tomato pieces in the bowl with the mixture from the food processor and the flaxseeds. I like getting everything in one bowl and waiting to stir until the flaxseeds finish soaking so that I can go clean up the rest of the dishes while I wait. Once the flaxseeds have been soaking for an hour, stir everything together with a spatula until well combined.
Bake
Using a large measuring cup, measure two cups of flacker-mixture onto 2 baking sheets lined with sil-mats or parchment paper and divide any remaining flacker-mixture between the two sheets, measuring if desired to get it as even as possible. Spread the flaxseed mixture until it is very close to the edges. It's a little like frosting a cake. Score the crackers using a spatula or dough scraper.
Bake at 200° F for 5 hours, placing the two baking sheets in the middle racks. Do not place baking sheets in the oven until after it is preheated. After 5 hours of baking turn the oven off, leaving the flackers in the warm oven. Go to bed if you want.
Return to the oven in 8-10 hours. Remove the flackers from the oven. The oven will still be warm. Be careful touching the baking sheets and use an oven mitt or towel if needed. Inspect the crackers; they will probably still be damp in a few spots. While the flackers are out of the oven, preheat the oven to 200° F. Bake for one hour, then leave them in the oven until they are dry. If there is a point when you can pull the crackers off of the liner and flip them over in one piece or a few pieces fairly easily, I recommend it. It helps to dry the crackers thoroughly and more quickly if you pull them off of the liner and flip them over. I have made these crackers by flipping them and not flipping them because they were already dry and crispy. ***UPDATE: Lately, I've been baking these at 170 degress F for 8 hours. Then I get up in the morning and check on them. Sometimes I let them go another hour or 2. They usually get crispy and I don't flip them, I just pull them off when they are cool and dry.***
Eat & Store
Once the flackers are dry and crisp, remove from the liner, break into crackers and serve or store in an airtight container once they have cooled. If the flackers bend and don't easily break, they need more oven time. Flackers can store for 2 weeks in an airtight container at room temp.
Notes
Nutrition information is approximate. It’s worth noting that since this recipe uses whole flaxseeds, all of their nutrition may not be absorbed when consumed. It depends on how well you chew. The good news is that you are getting lots of fiber and still absorbing a lot of nutrients.
Baking Sheet Liner Options
Sil-mats and parchment paper both work. The parchment paper sometimes tears, gets a little stubborn and needs to be peeled off in pieces. To make these crackers in a dehydrator, the original recipe’s instructions say to spread the flacker-mixture on Teflex sheet-lined dehydrator trays and dehydrate at 115 degrees F for 6 hours, then flip and remove Teflex sheets and continue dehydrating for at least another 6 hours. Please note that I have not tested this because I don’t have a dehydrator. I am just sharing what is written in the recipe I’ve adapted from.www.planttestkitchen.com