I’m so excited about this particular recipe because ANYONE can make this. There are so few ingredients and so few skills involved that my kids basically made it all. This means you can too. I’ve been asked a lot lately for “easier meals” or “fast recipes” which is kind of discouraging to me because I feel like I have posted recipes that are both of those things. But, in an attempt to meet half-way with people who want to start cooking, having never cooked much in the past, I offer you this recipe with love.
So, I had seen recipes before but saw a great look one on Pinterest here. This recipe had the perfect cheese-it (or cheez-it) flavor if not better, some of my taste testers said.
Cheese-its
(adapted from “Ready Made” and a few other sources)
8 ounces extra-sharp cheddar cheese, coarsely shredded
½ stick or 4 ounces unsalted butter, room temperature
1 teaspoons kosher salt
1 cup flour
2 Tablespoons water, iced
This recipe has so few ingredients I put them in bowls so my kids could mix them lickety-splickety.
Kids are great at measuring. Practice makes them understand fractions visibly instead of just in theory. Makes sense, right?
Yet another awesome kid skill…grating. When they are little, I think they believe it’s a magic trick and constantly check underneath to see if the trick is working.
Measure the cheese to get 8 oz, if it wasn’t already measured as an 8 oz. block.
Pre-measuring the ingredients helps to maintain the kids attention during cooking.
Cream the cheese, butter, and salt until combined. Add the flour until it looks like the above. Then, slowly add the water until the dough forms a ball. It may take 15 seconds or so for the dough to make the ball after you add the water so be careful not to add much more (I added a T. more).
Pat the dough in a disk and put in the fridge for an hour. Then, roll out the dough until it’s 1/8 of an inch.
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees
Cut them in 1″ squares. You can see by the lines that i let my kids help cut them out. They LOVED the pastry wheel.
I put the better looking ones on this tray and saved the weird ones for the next tray. Poke a hole in them with a chopstick and bake for
12 minutes.
Immediately test your product to make sure they are safe to feed other people, but be sure to actually share them.
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yum – great idea!
this looks so good i’m dying
Yummy! they look so good! :) Can’t wait to give it a try! :)
[…] Homemade Cheez-Its (A Golden Afternoon) Gimme gimme gimme! I love Cheez-Its (and Cheetos, for that matter), and am totally stoked about making them at home thanks to this recipe. […]
An oldie but a goodie! I didn’t ever think to make cheese it’s, there one of my favorites. Thanks for sharing, I need to make these!
These look de-lish! I’m kind of addicted to Cheese-its and these caught my eye right away :)
[…] Adapted from A Golden Afternoon […]
[…] …spending too much time on FoodGawker looking at delectable treats such as this. […]
[…] Cheese crackers, Graham crackers […]
We made these last night – they are sooo yummy! Thank you for the recipe!
We have been moving away from processed foods, but we could never give up our Cheese-its until now! There is no school tomorrow, so this will be on our to do list! Thanks!
PS: Is there a print link somewhere?
I should probably make one of those at some point…I keep making more food instead :)
I did some C&P work into a Word document so I could print it off. Here it is if anyone else wants to just C&P it. Heading to the kitchen with my 7 year old now!!
Cheese-its
(adapted from “Ready Made” and a few other sources)
8 oz extra-sharp cheddar cheese, coarsely shredded
½ stick unsalted butter, room temperature
1 tsp. kosher salt
1 c flour
2 T water, iced
Cream the cheese, butter, and salt until combined. Add the flour until it looks like the above. Then, slowly add the water until the dough forms a ball. It may take 15 seconds or so for the dough to make the ball after you add the water so be careful not to add much more (I added a T. more).
Pat the dough in a disk and put in the fridge for an hour. Then, roll out the dough until it’s 1/8 of an inch.
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees
Cut them in 1″ squares. You can see by the lines that i let my kids help cut them out. They LOVED the pastry wheel.
I put the better looking ones on this tray and saved the weird ones for the next tray. Poke a hole in them with a chopstick and bake for
12 minutes.
haha. Thanks, Jenni!
I made them today and they turned out better than the store-bought brand! Thanks again for sharing the recipe!
yay!! Glad it worked out :)
Hi!
Thanks for the recipe. We are going to try it out with our cooking club for kids at church in a couple of weeks. Do you know my chance how much this makes? Just so I know to double, triple, etc. based on how many kids I have attending.
Thanks!
Deahna
How fun! It makes enough for a small gathering of people…maybe 3 cereal bowls full. They are super yummy and go fast so you should probably make extra! Blessings!
How do you store them and for how long? Probably won’t last long in my house, but would like to know to maybe make a few batches at a time.
Thanks!
They don’t last long here either, Tosh :) I’ve freezed the dough successfully and you could also pop them in any storage container you have at home. They last the same amount as a homemade cookie…a few days and they start to lose their freshness. :)
Hello!! I am wondering…if I have salted butter do you think should I omit the salt?
You could do that but you will lose control of how much salt is in it ;)
Could you use whole wheat flour???
totally! Just be prepared for the dough to be more dry so add a touch more water. Another option would be to use half whole flour and half regular. ;)
Sorry could you let me know what is 1 c and 2 t in the recipie?
1/2 stick?
1 cup
2 Tablespoons
1/2 stick or 4 ounces butter
I changed it all in the recipe ;) Hope that helps! I have since changes my newer recipes to be more common measurements for the globe ;)
Thanks – I had my 16-year-old son make these last Sunday and they were great! He is what you might call a non-eater but is a perfect cook because he follows the recipes religiously. He is left-brain all the way. The nice thing is he has taken some of his creations to school and gotten some good feedback from the girls at lunch.
That’s so great! Glad there are some guys out there cooking ;)
Can you use a handheld mixer?
Hi Denise!
A handheld mixer is TOTALLY fine ;)
1/2 stick of butter and 4 oz of butter are not the same thing. A full stick of butter is 4 oz (at least the ones I have). Which one is it? I’m going to go according to your picture which looks like 1/2 stick! Hope it turns out! Thanks for the recipe.
Yes, 1/2 stick is right ;)
Have you ever tried using cheese that is already shredded? Or do you always shred it off the block? I am a teacher and have a ton of pre-shredded cheese but wasn’t sure if it would change how the recipe turns out.
I’m sure it would work, I just don’t use pre-shredded because it has extra thickeners and anti-caking ingredients that I try to avoid. ;)
Made them tonight. Turned out great! I used white whole wheat flour and they are wonderful. I should have rolled the dough a little thinner because mine are much thicker than an actual cheeze-it, but they still taste great. They don’t have that crunch like a cheeze-it but they haven’t cooled yet so maybe they will. Even without the crunch they are delicious. Can’t wait for the kids to try them tomorrow- probably for breakfast! Lol
Yay! Enjoy!
Can I freeze the dough? Or refrigerate the dough for 4 days? I want to make these as a snack for our trip.
You can definitely refrigerate the dough. No problem! Just let is soften enough to be rolled out before working with it ;) Enjoy!
I made these and they turned out delicous.
I’m so glad! Thanks for letting me know! ;)
I just made these today, flavor really good,the bottoms got crispy, but the top was chewy. What could have gone wrong?? The dough not thin enough? Did I not punch a good enough hole in center? Or handled my dough to much? Any thoughts.
I will try again
If it is too chewy, that might mean there’s too much moisture somehow. Maybe your cheese is different and not moist enough. Make sure you’re using a real aged cheddar, as opposed to a quickly produced one. Thats all I can think would help. ;)