Spicy parmasan crackers

  

It probably won't come as any surprise to anyone who's noticed the masthead that I rather like gin. The blog name comes from my twitter name, which in turn takes inspiration from a Dresden Dolls song, "Coin-operated boy", and was actually my husband's suggestion - the idea being that I come alive once gin is inserted. True, but in an emergency, wine, or even a nice cup of tea, will do.

But if I have a weakness for a nice gin and tonic, I have even more of a weakness for nibbly things to go with it. Although I like chocolate and enjoy cake, they're seldom my downfall. I am able, should I want to, to eat both in moderation.

When it comes to crisps and savoury nibbles, all moderation goes out of the window. These can't be kept in stock - they must be bought, a couple of packets on a Friday to last us the weekend. I've been known to hide packs of crisps bought on special offer in a different room so I don't see them when I'm opening the kitchen cupboards and become tempted. And while I love posh crisps, I love cheesy crispy things even more. You know the ones - the things that cost at least a couple of pounds a packet, where you look at the calories, go "that's not bad", and the realised it's per three nibbles. Who eats three nibbles?

So when I saw this recipe over at Domestic Sluttery, for parmesan and poppy seed crackers, I had to give them a go - especially as there was surprisingly little butter and parmesan in the recipe. (I am in no way suggesting these as a diet food. It's just they could be a lot worse.)

I liked the recipe, but made a couple of changes for the sake of ease - I didn't bother refrigerating the dough for ten minutes before rolling it into shape, as I have cold enough hands that it didn't go all sticky. And because it was slightly stickier than it would otherwise have been, I was able to roll it in the poppyseeds without needing to mess around with an egg glaze.

Because I wanted nibbles, I rolled it much smaller than recommended - roughly an inch in diameter. This meant that when I cut it up, after being good and putting it into the fridge for half an hour, I had hundreds of the things. Well, eighty.

After baking they certainly looked the part. Only thing was - they were VERY spicey, which was odd, since the recipe only described a "gentle warmth". I don't know if my cayenne pepper is particularly strong, but half a teaspoon was a lot, and they were perhaps more hot than was fun (still finished them all, natch). So next time I'll halve the cayenne. But there will be a next time. Possibly this weekend.