Learning How To Make Swedish Flatbread

Today Harold and I went to visit our friends Bill and Pat who live about an hour and a half northeast of us.   They live in the beautiful pine country of northern Minnesota.  Pat makes an excellent Swedish flatbread (but she is of some Norwegian heritage), and she taught me how to make it today.  Flatbreads are made by many Scandinavian Nordic folks in a variety of ways.  They are all pretty much the same:  large rounds of thin, crisp crackerbread that is broken into pieces to eat.   They are made with a variety of grains and buttermilk, a little leavening,  and a bit of sugar and salt.  Flatbread is very good just buttered, but I suppose a person could also put a little cheese or a thin slice of meat on top, too.  Flatbread is made similar to lefse, but no potatoes are involved, and the dough is cooked to a crisp, and further dried with a short baking in an oven.  These flatbreads can be stored indefinitely in a tin.  I don't know about the "indefinite" part, though, because they sure don't last long around my house!  Last year Pat gave us some as a Christmas gift and I can tell you they didn't last more than a day or two - they are so delicious.
     Before we began the flatbread making, we started off with a nice lunch!   You need energy to make flatbread, right?

Bill, Pat and Harold pictured here.  That's not wine - she is pouring out sparkling apple cider!  She had a delicious lunch of vegetable lasagna, salads, garlic bread and desserts. 

 Then we began the flatbread making:

The ingredients for making Flatbread:  corn mix, graham flour, regular wheat flour, buttermilk, sugar and salt.  You also need a rolling pin and a long lefse stick, and a plain ungreased griddle.

The dough is mixed in a large bowl, first by spoon, then by hand.

Pat sections off the dough in one inch thick slices.

The dough is rolled out on a well floured cloth, with a regular rolling pin, as thinly as possible without tearing or making holes.  Because there is a little baking soda in the dough, the rounds end up being somewhat thicker than lefse, about the thickness of a thin saltine.

The dough is baked on a hot 450-500 degree dry grill until there are light brown spots on both sides and the dough is no longer raw.   It is then placed on a cookie sheet in a 300 degree oven for just a few minutes, turning once.   The flatbreads are then placed on a rack to dry out until completely crisp.

One finished flatbread cooling on the rack.

We are finished!  The stack of about 15 flatbreads is ready to store now.

A closer look at the stack of crispy flatbreads before we broke them into pieces for storing.

Two tins of flatbread pieces I got to take home!  They are so good just buttered and eaten with a cup of coffee, tea or hot chocolate or cider.   When you want just a "little something" to eat with a hot beverage, Swedish Flatbread can't be beat!  It has a nice grainy taste, and is only slightly sweet.  

Here is the recipe as Pat gave to me:

Swedish Flatbread

1 box cornmeal muffin mix(I use Jiffy)

1 C. Graham flour

1C. white flour

1 C. buttermilk

1 tsp. soda

1 T. plus 1 tsp. sugar (add a little more if you want it sweeter)

Roll out thin and fry until light brown on lefsa griddle at 500 Degrees

Place on cookie sheet in 300 degree oven until it starts to harden . It gets stiff like cardboard.

Cool and break into pieces.  

Makes about 12 to 15 rounds, depending on how big you make them.