The Chia and Quinoa Crisp recipe caught my eye not long after I got my book – probably because the picture features the crisps turned into mini taco shells and recommends serving them with finely diced sashimi tuna, diced avocado, shoyu and a sprinkle of sesame seeds.

On the spur of the moment, I invited my sister and her daughter over for dinner on Saturday night.  Believe it or not, I actually made a non-Thermomix meal for us – Chicken Curry – but then I had a thermomix itch to scratch, so I decided to whip these up to go with some beautiful double brie I’d bought that morning – especially as I’d forgotten to buy more water crackers.

I had bought both white and black chia seeds a couple of weeks ago when I first bought the book.  I bought them at the local Woolworths from the Macro section, and from memory they cost about $10 per 250g bag. I would guess you could probably get them cheaper from a health food store if you have one close by.

I also had some quinoa which I had previously bought for the thermomix brown rice salad. I had the white quinoa, and new time I buy quinoa I’ll definitely buy some black and red quinoa as well, as I think it will make the crisps look a little nicer.  I used a mix of the white and black chia seeds for this recipe.

As for the recipe, you can’t get much simpler.  The seeds as mentioned, some sesame seed and a little bit of water.

Now, I’m going to sound gross here.  I’d never cooked with chia before, and only once before with quinoa, so I wasn’t really sure what to expect.  After I’d milled and added the water, I took the lid off.  All I can say is… Ewww.  There was a a hunk of water and chia/quinoa hanging from the lid, which looked suspiciously like something I’ve often wiped from my son’s nose.  Undeterred, I flicked it back into the bowl, gave it another couple of seconds mixing, and tried to banish the unsavoury thoughts from my mind!

The dough, if you can call it that, is pretty dry but sticky at the same time.  Dani recommends making little balls and then flattening them out between non stick paper with a rolling pin.  I had limited success with making the balls into evenly shaped discs, so my fussy side got the better of me and I rolled out quite a bit of the dough and used a cookie cutter to cut even sized circles.  I then rolled out the remnants again, until I used all the dough. The dough dries out very quickly, so you need to work really fast!!

Of course, once I was about three quarters of the way through making the discs, I realised that I hadn’t put the salt in the original mix…nightmare!  I am quite fond of salt, so instead of starting over, I brushed the tops of the discs with a little water and sprinkled some Maldon Sea Salt over them.  Once again, where too much water came off the brush and onto the discs, the result was more icky stuff, but once they were baked it completely disappeared.  Thank God!!

Next time I make them, I’m going to try rolling the dough into a sausage and try and slice them with the mandolin… might need to freeze it a little first, but the thickness of the discs would be beautiful and even – and my lot were a little haphazard.  I’m blaming my rolling pin.

I cooked them for a little longer than the recommended 5 minutes, but I think that might be more of the white quinoa factor than anything. I like crackers to look really toasted, so the browner the better as far as I’m concerned.

Anyway… they tasted lovely – we ate them all in one sitting (and a whole wheel of Double Brie), and someone was seen looking for more in the cupboard last night 🙂