In my coverage of best Super Bowl food products, I’ve focused so far on chips. Namely potato and tortilla. I now go into another salty snack which are crackers. The combination of cheese and crackers is the fourth most popular food to serve at Super Bowl parties after chips & dip, wings, and pizza.
Conventional crackers contain several of the denatured foods which contribute to the Standard American Diet and make people unhealthy. Crackers typically have refined flour along with baker’s yeast, which lacks nutritional value. Spraying glyphosate is common among conventional wheat growers. Many crackers use rancid vegetable oils, such as canola and soybean oil. Additionally, conventional crackers often contain synthetic vitamins, fillers, stabilizers, and GMOs.
In the recent years, we’ve seen companies pop up who offer healthier crackers with better ingredients . One methods of making better crackers is using sourdough. Sourdough uses wild yeast while conventional bread uses baker’s yeast, which is a single strain of yeast from a wild yeast culture. Baker’s yeast made it faster and cheaper to produce bread, but also removed a lot of the nutritional value.
Sourdough is healthier and easier to digest than regular bread for a number of reasons. It has a lower glycemic index than other breads. Sourdough is much lower in phytates due to the lactic acid bacteria in it. The fermentation process creates prebiotics and probiotics. Some people with gluten sensitivities can even handle sourdough.
Baking sourdough bread has become extremely popular in the past several years. When people make sourdough bread, there’s always left over starter culture. Sourdough crackers are a way to make good use of the remaining starter.
But not all sourdoughs are created equally. Even with sourdough, it’s important to use organic flour. Many sourdough bakers take a shortcut and use conventional flour thinking people will eat it just because it’s sourdough.
In alphabetical order, here are the 5 best organic sourdough crackers:
Georgia Sourdough
Coming from 25 years in the restaurant industry, Georgia Sourdough founder and baker Tracy Gibbon knows the importance of clean and healthy food. While on a summer trip to the supermarket with her niece, Tracy began looking at the ingredients on snack crackers. She noticed the basic ingredients were surrounded by bizarre and hard to pronounce words. Melissa attempted to explain the problems of conventionally farmed food and GMOs to her sister. Her sister responded that she doesn’t have time to think about every ingredient and just needs to think they’re safe. What Melissa’s sister said opened Tracy eyes. Tracy then set out to create a company serving modern day healthy food which people know is safe. Her snacks use organic ingredients made with the ancient process of sourdough making. Tracy’s crackers are all baked with the sourdough starter she used at the beginning. Georgia Sourdough crackers come in the flavors of sea salt, rosemary olive oil, cheese, everything, and cinnamon sugar.
Jovial
Jovial Foods Inc. was founded by the husband and wife team of Carla and Rodolfo Bertolucci. Both were born into families of talented home cooks. Food played an important role in their childhoods. When they discovered their daughter had gluten sensitivities, they felt it may be due to the changes in wheat and other plants. Looking at food’s past, they learned about nature’s original wheat einkorn. At the time, this ancient grain was nearly extinct. Carla and Rodolfo realized they had to bring it back to help other families. As they were both professionals in the organic food industry, they were able to revive it for the Jovial brand. Jovial sells einkorn flours, pasta, cookies, and crackers. Their einkorn crackers are baked with an organic sourdough and are found in the varieties of sea salt, rosemary, and everything. Jovial also has gluten free and grain free pastas along with jarred tomatoes, beans, and olive oil.
Revival Einkorn
Werner Forster founded Revival Einkorn as he had been on a lifelong journey to discover a game changing grain as a counter move to processed foods destroying people’s health. Werner had a background in organic fruit trade and sustainable aquaculture. Werner and his team are now devoted to producing einkorn products. The einkorn is grown on small family farms in Spain where wheat has been grown for hundreds of years without pesticides or toxic fertilizers. Because einkorn has a deep root system, no irrigation is needed. The farmers can rely exclusively on the seasonal rain. All of Revival Einkorn’s products have the einkorn de-hulled to remove the shells and become wheat berries. The berries are then stone milled, so the flavor and nutrition can remain intact. The farmers also maintain regenerative agriculture practices with methods of soil health and biodiversity. Revival Einkorn produces both whole wheat pasta and sourdough crackers. Their options for crackers are artisan’s daily, roasted garlic & chile, seeds & sea salt, and toasted sesame & honey.
Rustic Bakery
Rustic Bakery founders Carol LeValley and Josh Harris always had a passion for the simple sourdough flatbread crackers they’d bake for their friends. After a 2005 visit to the Cowgirl Creamery Outlet at the San Francisco Ferry Building, they told the Creamery’s owner that their cheese belongs on artisan crackers. With the Cowgirls’ first bite into the flatbread, they were ready to order 50 cases. Carol and Josh then searched for a commercial kitchen in their hometown of Marin county. They learned about a wine bar in Larkspur with an unused bakery in the back. They ended up buying the entire space and used the wine bar to serve coffee and croissants along with their crackers. Then in 2006, Rustic Bakery exhibited at the Winter Fancy Food Show, which was then held in San Francisco. Buyers all across the country took interest in their flatbread. Rustic Bakery now has 4 cafes and 28 products, including artisan crisps and flatbread cookies. They have regular sourdough flatbread crackers and a smaller version known as flatbread bites. Rustic Bakery’s flatbread flavors are olive oil & sel, rosemary & olive oil, sweet onion & creme fraiche, and everything spice.
The Sourdough Project
The Sourdough Project begins with founders Jen & Danny El-Azzi being overwhelmed with baking loaves of sourdough bread. So they decided try their hands at other types of sourdough baked goods, including crackers. As the crackers were a hit with everybody from their immediate family to their friends to their co-workers, Jen & Danny began selling them at the farmers market. This led to moving into an organic kitchen and selling in supermarkets. The heirloom wheat for The Sourdough Project is grown organically in Texas and fresh milled for them. Jen & Danny continue to make the cracker by hand so they can pay attention to every detail. Their crackers are available in the flavors for sea salt, dilly, everything, sun dried tomato & herb, beet & thyme, whole wheat, & za’atar.