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Corn Crackers

This recipe is adapted from the book =Crackers!= and was originally called
"Corn-Millet Circles." You can leave the millet out and make a plain
cracker, or substitute quinoa (pronounced "keen-wah" for those of you who
want to seem in the know at your local health food store) if you find
quinoa acceptable but not millet. You can use corn flour, corn meal or
popcorn flour, and you'll find that you get a different tasting cracker
depending on which you use. (I mill my own; corn flour milled from corn
I've dried myself has a fresh-corn, almost buttery taste. Flour milled from
grain corn bought at our new local health food store tastes more like corn
bread.) At any rate, this recipe is as easy to make as cookies and turns
out a product that doesn't taste like it's a GF-substitute for "the real
thing" especially since most of us have never eaten the like back in the
days when we ate wheat.

 1 cup corn flour
 1 cup GF-flour*
 1/4 cup whole millet or washed and dried quinoa (optional)
 1/2 teaspoon salt
 2 Tablespoons sugar
 1/4 cup vegetable shortening
 1/3 to 1/2 cup milk

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F.

Combine the flours in a bowl; mix well. Add millet, salt and sugar and mix
again. Cut in shortening until you get a consistency like coarse crumbs.
Slowly add in 1/3 cup of milk, allowing each addition to get well blended
into the mixture. If necessary, add in more until dough forms a cohesive
ball. Then add a drop or two more milk. The consistency should be softer
than for (wheat) pasta or pie dough. When you pick up the dough you should
be able to easily knead all the cracks out of it; if you can't then put it
back in the bowl and add a little more milk.

Divide the dough into two parts. On a GF-floured surface (or on a pastry
cloth) roll the dough out to about 1/8". Cut the dough with a cookie cutter
or slice it in strips one way and back again the other way. Remove the
crackers to an ungreased baking sheet (a spatula may help here). Prick the
crackers a few times with the tines of a fork.

Bake for 25-30 minutes, or until lightly browned, turning the crackers over
after about 15 minutes. Watch your first batch in the oven carefully to get
a feel for timing (each oven varies, after all) and remove any crackers
that cook fast. These crackers are best when cooked to a golden color
rather than being allowed to brown (though a slight browning around the
edges will do no harm).

Cool on a wire rack. Makes about 40-50 2" circles.

 * 2 parts white rice flour
   2/3 part potato starch flour
   1/3 part tapioca flour

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   This recipe, like all my recipes, is copyright 1995-1997 by
   Linda Blanchard.  I grant anyone anywhere the right to distribute
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