A Tasty Little Snack: Homemade Cheeze-Its

I typically don’t keep much junk food in the house, but I recently stumbled across a recipe for homemade cheeze-its and couldn’t wait to test them out for myself. These turned out great, and I don’t think I’ll be returning to the store-bought version any time soon! As an added bonus, here are some grocery coupons to possibly save on homemade Cheez-its ingredients.

Ingredients

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 8 oz. shredded sharp cheddar cheese
• 4 tablespoons cold butter
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon paprika
• 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper (I didn’t have any cayenne pepper on-hand, so I just used crushed red pepper flakes)

Preparation:

Combine ingredients in a food processor and blend until crumbly. Add cold water 1 tablespoon at a time until the mixture forms into dough (I wound up using 2 tablespoons). Shape into a ball, wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.

Place the dough on a floured surface and roll out with a rolling pin until it’s 1/8 inch thick. Cut dough into 1×1 inch squares using a serrated knife. Poke center of each square with one prong of a fork or the blunt end of a skewer. Sprinkle with extra salt on top.

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or spray with baking spray. Place crackers on sheet and bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes.

Cool, and enjoy!

A few pieces of advice:

• Be sure to roll out the dough until it’s 1/8 inch or else the crackers won’t be thin and crispy
• Sprinkle the salt on top VERY sparingly or even skip this step altogether if you don’t want the crackers to turn out too salty
• Unless you have a vacuum sealer, I recommend eating these as soon as they cool because they tend to lose their crispiness the next day