Graham Crackers

I recently posted a little poem called "Animal Crackers", which inspired me to look up some healthy animal cracker recipes (if such a thing can really exist).  I found this recipe for Whole Grain Graham Crackers/Animal Crackers on a blog called heavenlyhomemakers.com/blog . I tried it and it was really good; you will love her blog if you are interested in cooking healthy meals for your family.  I wish I had access to her blog years ago when I was raising young children.

Even though I had animal crackers on my mind, I didn't cut them into animal crackers this time, because I was impatient to make them and didn't feel like digging up my animal cookie cutters; I made Graham Crackers instead. The only problem with them is that you keep eating them. Steve just loved them.  We finished up one batch in one day, and then I made another. The first batch I made, was chocolate. We loved it. The second batch was just the regular "Honey Graham" Recipe, we loved it too.   Give them a try.. I think you're going to really love these.

Note: for Animal Cracker Instructions click here

Ingredients

2 1/4 whole wheat flour

1/2 cup dehydrated cane juice (also known as Rapadura or Sucanat found in health food store)

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

4 Tablespoons honey

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 stick butter

1/4 cup water

For Chocolate Grahams, add 1/3 cup cocoa

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350*.

2. Melt butter in a saucepan.

3. Stir in water, vanilla and honey. Set aside

4. In a mixing bowl stir together dry ingredients.

5. Add liquid ingredients to dry ingredients and stir until you form a ball.

6. Cut 2 pieces of parchment paper to fit the size of your cookie sheet,

placing one on the cookie sheet, the dough on top of that and the other sheet on top, and then roll out to the shape of the cookie sheet;

7. Remove the top sheet of parchment or wax paper and cut animal shapes with cookie cutter, or with a pizza cutter, cut into squares for grahams. Prick with fork if desired.

8. Bake for 18 minutes.

9. Turn off oven and leave crackers in oven 5 or 10 minutes longer in order to crisp them up. The original recipe suggested doing this even longer, but with the pizza stone, 5 minutes was truly sufficient.

10. Pull apart and lift from cookie sheet with spatula.

11. Serve and enjoy.