DIY Goldfish Crackers

In the last few months it has become all too noticeable, the affect that sugar has on J.  With even the slightest intake- she becomes irritable, irrational, unable to listen (more so than the average 2 yr old), crazy, and just down right difficult. Thus I have been on a mission to cut it out of her diet. It started with taking away all juices (even the 20/80 juice/water blend we used to give her), all fruit snacks (even our nice organic ones), all flavored rice milk drinks, and all crackers and chips (except on special occasions), etc. It was a rough first few days, but she has gotten used to it and mommy has greatly appreciated the results.

Now I'm on a mission to find fun snacks for her to eat that are both healthy, yummy, and easy to make at home. 

A little bit ago, I pinned the recipe for homemade goldfish crackers from Tasty Kitchen. 

These are a winner because they use only 5 ingredients (which I pretty much always have on hand), are very simple to make, and best of all--- J has put her stamp of approval on them. She looooves her homemade goldfish crackers. *Though if your child is used to Goldfishes, he/she may not like them as much. Our play date wasn't as thrilled. And I can't offer my opinion, as my dairy allergy won't let me eat them*

My first try looked something like this:

I had the dough all rolled out and started cutting out my "fishie" shapes with my homemade fishie cutter, fashioned from an old soda can. 

Here they are all organized on the lined cookie sheet, waiting to go in the oven.

After baking, they were a bit puffier, the thinner the dough, the crispier the cracker

As you can see, I got a bit lazy and finished the DOUBLE BATCH by just cutting diamonds.
So I guess they kind of morphed into homemade cheese-its? 

The result was a container of healthy-ish goldfish crackers, that I can give to J without worrying. 

SUCCESS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

If you would like to make your own crackers, this is what you will need. 

Ingredients

8 oz cheddar cheese, grated

4 Tbsp butter, cubed

1 cup flour

3/4 teaspoon salt

2 Tbsp cold water

How to

Add everything (minus the water) into a blender and pulse until the consistency of "coarse sand".

Take your water and add that 1 Tbsp at a time, while continuing to pulse. 

(You may need a bit more water if you live in a very dry place like me)

Remove dough, wrap in plastic wrap and chill in the fridge for about 20 minutes (if you leave it too long, it is hard to work with.... just take my advice)

After dough is chilled, remove and roll out.

Cut desired shapes out and bake on a lined cookie sheet at 350 F for approx 15 minutes, or until crispy. 

Remove from oven, let cool and ENJOY!!!!

Let me know if you make the crackers, and how they turn out for you!!!