Vegan feta crackers for sleepless nights

It’s been a good week for food but not for Sylvia sleeping. I have cooked stuff that I have had in my head for too long. Much experimentation. Some good. Some bad.

I wish I wasn’t finishing off my pumpkin bread pudding as I write because it is superb. The wonderful memory of velvety nettle soup lingers on my tongue. I still have visions of my vibrant purple dinner. But I am a bit unsure about the gluten free gingerbread and am ready to throw out the poppy seed cupcakes. Most of these will appear on the blog soon, provided I can find time.

Today I wanted to tell you about how when babies don’t sleep it can drive you (to) crackers. Great vegan crackers! My idea of heaven this week is to lie in bed eating my tofu crackers and pumpkin bread pudding, reading a good book and drifting off into a long deep sleep.

Sylvia has been great at sleeping while we sleep until just recently when she has started to wake in the night. I saw the nurse for her 8 month check up yesterday and we discussed all sorts of reasons for this. The most likely seems to be that she is teething. A few people have suggested I try cutting dairy out of my diet, not just to help her sleeping but also for her dry skin.

I understand the sense of cutting out dairy. The introduction of lots of new foods as she starts solids is quite a strain on her little system as well as my varied diet that she consumes through the breast milk. Others have said it wouldn’t make much difference. Contradictory advice seems par for the course with caring for a baby. I thought it wouldn’t hurt to try going dairy-free for a week or two.

It wasn’t as easy as I expected. In the past I have enjoyed some vegan baking – once to the extent that my housemate got tired of it and left a note on the fridge saying ‘let the wild soy run free’! I don’t like eggy or creamy food very much but I love my cheese and yoghurt. On a couple of occasions I found myself eating cheese without even realising it. I had thought I could find some cheese substitutes but I haven’t found anything to love.

I’ve been to Radical Grocery (347 Sydney Rd, Brunswick). I’ve tried different vegan cheeses. I was surprised to find that the first soy cheese I bought was only lactose free but still had casein in it. It tasted like Kraft slices (or Velveeta). The tofutti cheese was so full of ingredients it didn’t look too healthy and the cheezly that I tried was dry. We bought soyatoo cream (which is called slag cream in our house because the German translation is Soya Schlag Crème) and was shocked at how sweet it was – more like that horrible synthetic cream in a can than anything out of a cow. E likes it. He also likes the soy milk we have bought. The dairy substitutes didn't thrill me but I loved the Lara Bars and fudge.

My dislike of vegan faux cheese is no surprise given that I have never been a fan of faux meat as a vegetarian. But what I have liked in the past are vegan cheese sauces such as this one, that are made out of ingredients such as tofu, nutritional yeast flakes, mustard, and tahini. So I decided to try reworking a recent feta and pepper cracker recipe that I loved.

The crackers are adapted from a Feta and Cumin Crackers recipe from Lisa’s Kitchen. I liked the idea of rubbing the feta and oil into the flour rather than using butter. They were quite bready rather than light and crisp like I expect of crackers (or dry biscuits). They are lovely plain or with some dips. I tried using tofu and nutritional yeast flakes rather than feta because I thought it would give the right texture and cheesy saltiness. I also added some pesto from La Manna Fresh (403-407 Sydney Rd, Brunswick) that I was pleased to find is vegan. The vegan crackers were as good as the feta ones, even better, E said.

I made a double quantity because I was optimistic about this recipe. I wished for even more. They were eaten quickly and with enjoyment. We ate them with nettle soup, E took some to work and shared them with colleagues, I took them to a friends’ house, I took some down to my parents’ place, and I even found myself snacking on one in the middle of the night after getting up to settle Sylvia.

This experience has made me think about a vegan diet. Niki has an interesting post on cheese from a vegan perspective. Kathryn directed me to an interesting article, ‘Against Meat’ by Jonathan Safran Foer in the New York Times (7 Oct 2009), which describes being vegetarian simply as not hurting animals. At a gut level, I feel right about being vegetarian – I had the upsetting experience of finding out that when our pet lambs had ‘gone to greener pastures’ we had eaten them. But I lived with chooks in the backyard and regularly visited dairy farms as a child and never felt these animals were being treated badly. I respect those who are vegan but I am not about to veganise my diet. However, I think I will try and reduce my dairy intake.

In thinking about being vegan, I have wondered about if a breastfed baby is a vegan. I had a look on the web and couldn’t find an answer. I’d be interested to hear people’s thoughts on this.

I am giving both feta and tofu crackers recipes and am sending the tofu crackers to Yasmeen who is holding an event called Health Nut Challenge 2: guilt free snacks. I think these fit the bill in more ways than one!

Feta Cheese and Pepper Crackers
adapted from Lisa’s Kitchen
makes about 3 dozen

1 cup of wholemeal flour
½ cup white bread flour
¼ cup buckwheat flour
½ teaspoon baking powder (Lisa used bicarb of soda)
100g feta cheese, crumbled
5 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon sea salt
¾-1 tsp pepperberry, ground (or black pepper)
¾ cup milk

Place the flours, baking powder, salt, pepper, olive oil and feta in a large bowl and rub together with your fingers to combine. Make a well in the centre and pour in the milk. Stir to combine and knead briefly to form a ball. Wrap the dough in cling wrap and place in freezer for roughly 30 minutes if you are in a hurry or in the fridge for at least 45 minutes.

I found the dough quite soft once cool but still fine to work with if you are generous in dusting it with flour. Divide the dough in half. Roll out a portion of dough on a floured surface until it is about 0.5 cm thick. Use a scone cutter or glass to cut out rounds or shapes of your choice. Roll out the extra dough and repeat. Place crackers on baking tray lined with baking paper. Prick with a fork.

Bake the crackers in a preheated 180 C or 350 F degree oven for about 25 minutes until they are lightly browned. Cool on a wire rack.

Tofu and Pesto Crackers
makes about 6 dozen

2 cups of wholemeal flour
1 cup white bread flour
½ cup buckwheat flour
1 tsp baking powder
350g firm tofu, crumbled
8 tbsp (120ml) vegan pesto
6 tbsp (90ml) olive oil
6 tbsp (90ml) nutritional yeast flakes
2 tsp sea salt (maybe 1 tsp would be enough)
1 cup soy milk

Place the flours, baking powder, salt, nutritional yeast flakes, pesto, olive oil and tofu in a large bowl and rub together with your fingers to combine. Make a well in the centre and pour in the milk. Stir to combine and knead briefly to form a ball. Wrap the dough in cling wrap and place in freezer for roughly 30 minutes if you are in a hurry or in the fridge for at least 45 minutes. I left some of this dough in the fridge for 48 hours and it was ok although a little tougher than the fresh batch.

I found the dough quite soft once cool but still fine to work with but dust with lots of flour. Divide the dough into four portions. Roll out a portion of dough on a floured surface until it is about 0.5 cm thick. Use a scone cutter or glass to cut out rounds or shapes of your choice. Roll out the extra portions and repeat. Place crackers on baking tray lined with baking paper. Prick with a fork. (NB I forgot to prick the second batch and they puffed up a little.)

Bake the crackers in a preheated 180 C or 350 F degree oven for about 25-30 minutes until they are lightly browned. Cool on a wire rack.

Update 10.10.10: I made these today and only had about 6tbsp of pesto so I added a little pumpkin instead of the last few tbsp of pesto - worked well! Sylvia loves them!

On the stereo
Classic Steve Winwood – Steve Winwood