Sourdough Crispbread

My lunch. The photo was supposed to feature the crispbread, but then I went and covered it in artichoke hearts, pickled eggplant, lettuce, rocket and tomatoes. You can still just see the crispbread, and you’ll have to take my word for it for the moment, I can still taste it.

In February 2011, the wonderful Celia from Fig Jam and Lime Cordial gifted me a sourdough starter. I haven’t bought bread (at least when I’m at home) ever since.

There’s something about sourdough – the simplest of ingredients, the living culture, the soft resilience of the dough as you handle it, the mindfulness in being a day ahead of need – no matter how busy I get it’s worth it. And the sense of security (as so many in Covid lockdowns discovered) in being able to magic not just food but something really comforting and filling and healthy and delicious out of an almost bare pantry, without going near a shop. It’s easy, cheap, and very good.

But therein lies the danger. I really do need to cut down the amount of bread I eat! A jar of sourdough crispbread on the shelf stretches the time between loaves enough that I can put whatever I like on top of it. I posted a recipe for Seedy Sourdough Crispbread just over a decade ago, and the recipe has only evolved a little bit since then, just enough to make it worth a new post. One of the main things about the new recipe is that, if you have fed sourdough starter, you can make it in less than half an hour, start to finish, which puts it up there with pita bread for speed.

The Recipe

I make pita every weekday morning for the grandkids school lunches, so my sourdough starter comes out of the fridge pretty fed and alive. If you use your starter less regularly, you might need to bring it back to life by feeding it first (and give it an hour or so to liven up). If you need a refresher about sourdough starter feeding here’s one.

Put a good slurp of fed sourdough starter in a bowl, or a small slurp and feed it. How much? That depends on how big a batch you want to make. There are no rules. All the rest of the ingredients are dry, so as much starter as you need to make the dry ingredients into a dough.

To the starter, add a good pinch of salt and a handful of psyllium husks. The psyllium is the binding agent in the crispbread so it’s essential. Everything else is optional.

I add a handful of chia seeds next, stir them in, and leave it sit for a few minutes to soak up the starter. The dough at this point should be thick but still very sticky.

Next in is a handful each of linseed meal, poppy seeds, sesame seeds and, if I have them from the garden, amaranth seeds. You could no doubt substitute any seeds you have or like.

Then I add enough macadamia meal to make the dough knead-able. Again, you can no doubt substitute any nut meal you have or like.

Finally, I put a handful of coconut flour on the benchtop, tip the dough onto it, knead briefly and roll it out. You could substitute any fine dry flour – plain flour, or semolina, or anything that lets you roll it out thin without sticking to the bench.

With a coconut floured rolling pin, I roll the dough out as thin as I can, ideally 5mm or so. I carefully lift the sheet of dough over the rolling pin and lay it in a biscuit tray, poke it all over with a fork, then use a pizza cutter to cut into crispbreads. (The tray doesn’t need oiling).

I bake for 20 minutes or so in a medium oven (around 180°C) till the crispbreads are light golden. Allow to cool on a rack – they crispen up a bit more as they cool – then store in an airtight tin or jar.