Sourdough Crackers with Gruyère and Thyme

These Sourdough Crackers with Gruyère and Thyme are so cheesy, puffy, and delicious, and they are a wonderful recipe for using sourdough discard.

I decided to make these sourdough crackers with Gruyère and thyme after refreshing my dormant sourdough starter. My levain/starter had been languishing in my refrigerator for about four weeks, and needed a couple of feedings to get it going.

The dough for these sourdough crackers is a dream to work with. It comes together like pie dough, and rolls out beautifully between sheets of wax paper or parchment paper.

If you are a regular reader, you know that one of my favorite cheeses is Gruyère. It's delicious and rich on its own, and it melts beautifully. It's never too grainy or greasy. In fact, it's the cheese most often used in fondue. If it's too pricy where you live, you could substitute Swiss cheese with delicious results.

I was able to harvest the thyme for these crackers from a pot in or backyard! The herbs that actually survive in our yard are parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme. Simon and Garfunkel would be proud.

The key to getting these crackers to puff up is using cold butter and chilling the dough. In fact, you can make the dough up to two days in advance and then wrap it and place it in the refrigerator.

Check out the puffy crackers!

If you don't have sourdough starter, don't despair. You can mix an equal amount of flour and water by weight, along with a tiny pinch of yeast, and let the mixture sit, covered with plastic wrap, until it has risen and fallen, about 12 to 24 hours.

To cut out the dough for these crackers, I used a 1 1/2 inch fluted cookie cutter from this set from the Culinary Institute of America. If you can't find these cookie cutters, any small cookie cutter will work with this recipe.

These puffy sourdough crackers emerge from the oven all crispy and delicious. They are wonderful as appetizers, with a glass of bubbly, or with tomato soup. If you need to, you can re-crisp leftovers in a 250 degree F oven for about 15 minutes.

Do you have extra sourdough starter? Here are a couple of great recipes for using your discard:

• Sourdough Crackers with Herbs
• Blueberry Cornmeal Sourdough Muffins

After the recipe, be sure to check out the rest of the crackers that the Bread Bakers made this month. Thank you to Sue of Palatable Pastime for choosing the theme and hosting.

Yield: 36 to 48 crackers

Sourdough Crackers with Gruyère and Thyme

ingredients:

• 120 grams (1 cup) all purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt (or table salt)
• 1/4 teaspoon granulated garlic
• 60 grams (1/4 cup) sourdough starter discard
• 56 grams (4 tablespoons) cold unsalted butter, in small cubes
• 227 grams (8 ounces) grated Gruyère cheese
• 20 grams (2 tablespoons) grated Parmesan cheese
• Leaves from 6 sprigs of thyme, plus more for garnish
• 3 to 4 tablespoons of ice water

instructions:

1. Put all of the ingredients with one tablespoon of the water into the bowl of a food processor. Pulse the ingredients until it is crumbly. With the food processor running, slowly pour in the water until the dough begins to clump. Do not over mix. 
2. Remove the dough from the food processor, divide the dough in half, form each half into a disk, and wrap each with plastic wrap. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes, and up to two days. 
3. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Roll out the dough as thinly as possible, about 1/8 inch, between two pieces of wax or parchment paper. Using a 1 1/2 inch cookie cutter, cut the dough into rounds, and place them on a parchment lined baking sheet, about 1/2 inch apart. Use a toothpick to poke a hole in the middle of each dough round. Gather up the scraps, re-roll, and cut more crackers. 
4. Bake the crackers for about 15 to 18 minutes, until light golden brown. Cool on the sheet pan. Repeat with the other half of the dough. Store the cooled crackers in an airtight container. 

http://www.karenskitchenstories.com/2018/03/sourdough-crackers-with-gruyere-and.html

Recipe adapted from the amazing book, Artisan Sourdough Made Simple.

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#BreadBakers is a group of bread loving bakers who get together once a month to bake bread with a common ingredient or theme. Follow our Pinterest board right here. Links are also updated each month on this home page. We take turns hosting each month and choosing the theme/ingredient.