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Homemade Whole Wheat Goldfish Crackers Recipe

68 Comments

Crunchy whole grain goldfish crackers are fun to pop in your mouth and made from simple whole food ingredients! Make these with your kids for a fun snack-tivity!

Homemade Whole Wheat Goldfish Crackers. Homemade goldfish! Don't you just love these little fish cutters?

Making food from scratch takes time and effort. But the payoffs are worth it! It will help your children learn to cook, teach them that cooking at home is valued and important, help to create healthy life long habits, provide more nutritious meals and snacks, and create bonding opportunities.

We love making meals and snacks that are kids can help us with in the kitchen.  Making these crackers with your kids meet all of these goals!  And these are 100% whole wheat, which provides much more fiber, more antioxidants, vitamins and minerals and many studied long-term health benefits.

One of the best things about this homemade whole wheat goldfish crackers recipe is that not only are you making a wholesome snack, but you are providing an activity for your kids at the same time!!  Think of it as edible playdough! Seriously – my daughter Sophie sat and cutout little fishies and rolled the dough and cut out more for at least 30 minutes.  She loved it.  And then she stood and watched the crackers bake because she was so excited to try the ones she had just cutout.  So in total, making these crackers occupied her for about 45 minutes.  We had fun making them and eating them together!

These crackers are buttery, cheesy, and have about a million times the flavor of store bought goldfish crackers.  Trust me, they aren’t just for kids 🙂

Homemade Whole Wheat Goldfish Crackers. Homemade goldfish! Don't you just love these little fish cutters?

I had a mom write in and ask me if I really made my own crackers even with having small kids running around.  Absolutely!  They only have 5 ingredients and take minutes to whip up.  The most time consuming part is cutting them out, and that is where the kids come in to help! Also, you can make a big batch of dough and keep it in your fridge.  When you want more crackers, just pull it out and let it warm to room temperature, roll it and follow the remainder of the recipe.  Minutes I tell you!

How to Make Homemade Goldfish Crackers

The easiest way to make these (and any homemade cracker) is in a food processor.

Combine the ingredients until it forms a course sand-like dough. Once you add the water, it should begin to form a dough ball.

Roll it between two pieces of wax or freezer paper and chill for about 10 minutes.  Then you will want to roll your dough on a surface.  The thinner you roll it, the thinner and crispier the crackers.  If you roll it out thicker, you will have a softer more bread like cracker, which is still delicious.

Use a fish cutter to cut out the shapes. Lay them on a pan and bake at 350 degrees for 12-20 minutes depending on how thick your crackers are. The longer you bake, the more crispy they will be.

Storage Tips for Homemade Crackers

To store these, place in an airtight container.  Mine did soften after about 1 day, but I still thought they were delicious.  I have heard that if you place them in a tin, or metal container, they won’t soften.  You can store these for up to 1 week.

Homemade Whole Wheat Goldfish Crackers. Homemade goldfish! Don't you just love these little fish cutters?

More Healthy Homemade Crackers

Homemade Wheat Thins

Herb Crackers

Corn Chips

Peanut Butter Crackers

Homemade Whole Wheat Goldfish Crackers. Homemade goldfish! Don't you just love these little fish cutters?
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3.8 from 103 votes

Homemade Whole Wheat Goldfish Crackers

Prep Time25 minutes
Cook Time20 minutes
Course: Snack
Cuisine: American
Servings: 8
Calories: 318kcal

Ingredients

Instructions

  • Add the flour and salt to a food processor and pulse. Then add butter and pulse until the mixture resembles coarse meal. Add grated cheese a little at a time and pulse.
  • Add water, one tablespoon at a time, until the dough forms into a ball. Continue pulsing between tablespoons – this could take a minute. You can also feel the dough and if it shapes into a ball, it is ready.
  • Flatten between two pieces of wax or freezer paper, and chill for 10-20 minutes. This helps the butter get cold and makes for a puffier cracker.
  • Roll the dough fairly thin. About 1/8 of an inch is a good thickness. More thin = crispier, but you don’t want it paper thin.
  • Cut out shapes and place on a baking sheet.
  • Bake at 350 degrees F for 12-20 minutes depending on how thick your crackers are.
  • Store in an airtight container for up to 1 week.

Nutrition

Calories: 318kcal | Carbohydrates: 22g | Protein: 11g | Fat: 22g | Saturated Fat: 13g | Cholesterol: 59mg | Sodium: 482mg | Fiber: 3g
Keyword : Homemade Whole Wheat Goldfish Crackers

www.superhealthykids.com

Homemade Whole Wheat Goldfish Crackers

Natalie Monson

I'm a registered dietitian, mom of 4, avid lover of food and strong promoter of healthy habits. Here you will find lots of delicious recipes full of fruits and veggies, tips for getting your kids to eat better and become intuitive eaters and lots of resources for feeding your family.

Learn More about Natalie

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Recipe Rating




68 Comments

Can you freeze the dough of any of these crackers or freeze the crackers themselves? Would love to make double batches for easy cooking/serving at a later time.

I don’t have a food processor!? What is the best way for me to mix them??? Thank you so much for this recipe I’ve always wanted to make my kids healthy cracker alternative!

I don’t have a food processor but I use a blender and do small batches at a time in the blender so it doesn’t get stuck. It works well for me.

non food processor owners -rub dry ingredients into butter and then add cheese and repeat, it will look the same at this stage as it does in pic. then use wooden spoon to mix in water and then knead like bread.

You can always make dough without a food processor. You would need to cut the butter into the dry ingredients until the crumbs are pea size or smaller. And when you mix in the water use a fork to stir, stir it the same way you would scramble your eggs

Don’t have food processor? Do as you would to make pie crust, two fork or dough cutter. You can do this using hand or stand mixture, blender, but in pulse Motion.

I made them a week ago and they were excellent, my whole family loves them! Thank you so much for the recipe! I also froze half of the dough and just unfroze them and made them tonight. They turned out perfect, just like the day I first made them! Thanks again!

These taste exactly like Country Cheese biscuits & were such a hit in our family.

I dont own a food processor – I just mixed the salt, flour & butter till it had a crumb consistency & then added the cheese & water & mixed by hand till combined

Hi Lauren! I’ve found the key is to keep all your ingredients as cold as possible so the dough/pastry isn’t greasy. Freeze your butter and cheese for about 15-20 minutes before you use it. I use a regular-sized (cheese) grater and ‘shred’ both the cheese AND butter into my dry ingredients. Use a sharp pastry cutter to blend cheese and butter into dry ingredients. Then put ice cubes into a bowl with some water, allow to get cold and measure out your Tablespoons of water from that, and proceed with recipe as written above! Hope that helps…

They turned out super delicious, I just wonder why your whole wheat flour is so white? My crackers were more brownish, not yellow like yours.

Love this! I live in Australia now and one of the things I miss from home the most are gold fish (Don’t really know why!) It’s a rainy day and my daughter and I just got through making your yummy granola and now we’re going to try this out! Thanks for the recipe 🙂

I would love to make these but cannot have wheat. Could I substitute the wheat flour for gluten free all purpose flour? Or is there a different gluten free flour I could use? Thank you!

We haven’t tried other flours @dandelionmama, but please let us know if you do and how they turn out. People are always asking!

Two questions

1. What food processor do you recommend?

2. What do you use to grind your wheat? I was looking at a wheat grinder but also considering a vitamix or blendtec. Not sure if they can be used to make flours.

My daughter loves the original goldfish crackers with hummus, do you know if it would be possible to make them without the cheese?

Thanks

I bought the fish cutters a while back and tried this recipe. I had a terrible time getting the fish shaped dough to come out of the cutter each time so the fish looked awful and it took FOREVER. Any tips to help that process? Anyone else have this problem?

Jennifer, you can try dusting the top of the rolled out dough with flour before cutting them or dipping the cookie cutter in flour. Also make sure your cookie cutter is free of oil and water. this helps me when I’m making cut out cookies as well as these fantastic crackers.

5 stars
very easy, totally delicious, and a whole wheat option of something I find myself craving all the time

Love these! We also added a dusting of white cheddar popcorn flavoring. They taste just like white cheddar cheez it’s!

Great recipe! I used gouda instead of cheddar, to get a milder taste. And I left the dough a bit thicker, which yielded puffed up (but still very crunchy) crackers.

Hi Sara, that’s a great question! Honestly we’ve never tried freezing them, because they’re so quick to get gobbled up. But I would imagine they would freeze (and thaw) well. Please let us know how it works if you try it.

5 stars
I make these every few months and they are to die for!! Everyone loves them! Better than any store bought cracker and a good weekend afternoon spent cutting them all out. I bought some small fish cookie cutters on Amazon.

What did I do wrong? My dough is quite brown and the flour flavor is overwhelming. I double checked my measurments so I do not think I added to much flour.

Hi Chandelle, I’m sorry they didn’t turn out how you were expecting! Did you use mild or sharp cheddar? Mild sometimes gives less of a cheesy kick to the crackers, so maybe the wheat taste came through a bit more. Also if your cheddar was white, it wouldn’t turn the dough orange.

5 stars
Worked out well. My only addition is to re chill the cut out shapes in the pan for 5 minutes if you can make the room in your freezer. By the time I cut everything out they were not cold anymore. They puffed up really nice and flaky.

Hi, for the nutrition facts what is the serving size / quantity per carbs? I see 22g but not for how many. My sons diabetic and we calculate by carbs he loves gold fish but they make his glucose sky rocket so I hope this can be a option for him thank you so much