HERB CREAM CHEESE CRACKERS…there’s more to buckwheat than meets the eye!!

Benjamin Franklin

Couldn’t resist adding that quote…sorry guys!

…I’m beginning to have more fun in the kitchen. That bag of buckwheat flour has done me a world of good. It keeps beckoning to me from the shelf. Was back to Heidi @ 101 Cookbooks to drool over some delicious looking Swedish Rye Cookies, when a note in the middle of her post grabbed my attention. She had let loose some pearls of wisdom about trying the Swedish Cookies in a savoury avatar. Fancy that? Of course I did, & the feet found themselves moving towards the kitchen with a strange sense of excitement. It was like working in the Chemistry lab back in school, when mixing different solutions resulted in magical colours (& smells to faint by). Still fun with experiments ruled nonetheless. Now a parallel fascination continues. I worked like a busy bee throwing in a bit of this & a bit of that, throwing caution to the wind…how much can go wrong with substituting flours? It was just the sans sugar factor that bothered me, but I plodded on. The end result, as you can see, turned out to be cracking good! The fact happily endorsed by my ever enthusiastic little official taster! Crackers with herbs, za’atar, to be more specific. Za’atar is a Middle-eastern herb which my hub’s niece got for me from Dubai. She is new to cooking/baking & regularly stops by my blog for ideas, & has now become an expert on adana kebabs, lamb curries, apple crumbles & much more. She plays Santa every few months & religiously gets me a bag of goodies to intrigue me further. This time it was za’atar in a bag of yummy ingredients that caught my eye… as did her poppet of a daughter … all of 2 years old with sea green eyes, a bit like the colour of the za’atar!!

Za’atar is generally prepared using ground dried thyme, oregano, marjoram, or some combination thereof, mixed with toasted sesame seeds, and salt. It is a mixture of herbs and spices used as a condiment with Middle Eastern origins. The name of the condiment shares the Arabic name of the herb used as the main ingredient. Za’atar is used as a seasoning for meats and vegetables. It can be mixed with olive oil to make a spread called za’atar–wu–zayt as a dip for the sesame bread rings known as ka’ak. Za’atar can also be spread on a dough base and baked as a bread, in which case it is called manaeesh bi zaatar. It can be sprinkled on labneh (yogurt that has been drained until it becomes a tangy, creamy cheese). Za’atar is often sprinkled on hummus or served with olive oil as a spread or dip. It can also be used to spice meat and vegetables and can be mixed with salt, rolled into balls and preserved in oil, or dried in the sun I even pinched a bit of dough & rolled out a petite pastry shell to see if it would make a crust. It did…a perfect & pretty little crust … am now thinking ‘fillings’. Goat cheese & cherry tomatoes, caramelised onions, or maybe broccoli & cauliflower. Any suggestions are most welcome…

Buckwheat – 1/2 cup
Oatmeal – 1 cup (I ground a cup of Quaker oats in my coffee grinder)
Flour – 1/2 cup

Butter – 1/2 cup (100gms); chilled & cut into cubes
Za’atar – 1/4 – 1/3 cup (as per taste); you can even substitute this for any other herb of your choice, or then freshly ground black pepper. Do adjust the salt accordingly as za’atar has salt of its own
Freshly ground pepper
Sea salt to taste
Cream cheese – 100 gms
Grated cheddar cheese – 50 gms