Nutrition
| Per 100 g | Per 1 oz (28 g) | |
|---|---|---|
| Energy | 519 kcal | 147 kcal |
| Protein | 26.2 g | 7.4 g |
| Fat | 38.8 g | 11 g |
| saturated | 3.2 g | 0.9 g |
| Carbohydrate | 10.5 g | 3 g |
| sugars | 3.7 g | 1.1 g |
| Fibre | 17.4 g | 4.9 g |
| Sodium | 365 mg | 104 mg |
Estimated from the ingredients, for the finished dried product. Actual values vary with the produce you use and how far you dry it.
Ingredients
- 1.1 kg almonds, soaked overnight and dried
- 1 3/8 cups ground chia seeds
- 1 3/8 cups nutritional yeast
- 13 tablespoons fresh thyme, chopped
- 2 3/4 teaspoons salt
Instructions
- Soak the almonds overnight and dry them properly before they go in the processor. A wet almond grinds to a paste rather than a meal, and the paste makes a cracker that never turns crisp.
- Soak the ground chia in water for half an hour until it thickens to a gel and drain what has not been taken up. The chia gel is the binder in this recipe — there is no flour here, and nothing else holds the sheet together.
- Pulse the almonds on their own until they are the texture of coarse sand, then add the chia, nutritional yeast, thyme and salt. Almonds ground with wet ingredients present go straight past meal into butter.
- Trickle in water with the motor running, a few drops at a time, until the mixture just holds together and spreads. Stop at spreadable: another splash and it thins to a batter that runs off the sheet.
- Spread it on solid sheets to an even layer and score it into squares once the surface has firmed enough to hold a line. Scoring too early closes the cuts back up; scoring too late cracks the sheet at random.
- Dehydrate at 46 °C for 13 hours, flipping the sheet onto mesh once it is firm enough to lift in one piece. Nutritional yeast browns if it is pushed hotter, and browned yeast loses the savoury note the whole cracker is built on.
- They are ready when a cooled cracker snaps rather than flexing and the thyme is brittle enough to crumble off the surface. Any that bend go back on the mesh for another hour and get tested again.
- Store them in an airtight container in the cupboard and eat them inside a fortnight. Ground almond carries a lot of oil, and these go flat and slightly bitter well before they lose their crunch.
