These Pesto Keto Crackers combine a buttery crisp texture with the Italian taste that everyone loves. The flavor is a delightful combination of garlic, basil, and black pepper with just a hint of cayenne to waken up the taste buds. Enjoy these crackers by themselves, float them in soup, spread them with olive tapenade, or substitute them as croutons in a salad. You can even crush them up and use them in place of cracker crumbs for a yummy Italian style breading for meat or fish. Of course, they make a perfect backdrop for cheese—we especially love them with Parmesan.
Crackers are one food I’ve missed the most since going on a low-carb diet. Cheese just isn’t the same without the crunch of a cracker. It’s easy to miss having crackers with soup or even just having them by themselves as a snack. Yet, making homemade keto crackers can seem complicated and intimidating at first glance.
This cracker recipe is made to help fill those empty places. If you’ve never made your own crackers, don’t worry, this recipe is simple and quick to make.
We used almond flour to keep the carb count down. Almond flour also gives them a subtle nutty base flavor that goes well with the herbal tones.
It’s easy to change the way these crackers look. We like to let them cool and break them into large pieces—it gives them a rustic appearance. However, you can use cookie cutters or a butter knife and turn them into all kinds of shapes.
Yields 6 servings of Pesto Keto Crackers
The Preparation
- 1 1/4 cups almond flour
- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/4 teaspoon dried basil
- 1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
- 1 teaspoon fresh garlic, pressed
- 2 tablespoons pesto
- 3 tablespoons butter
The Execution
1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
2. In a medium bowl, combine almond flour, pepper, salt and baking powder and whisk until smooth.
3. Add basil, cayenne, and garlic and stir until evenly combined.
4. Next, add in the pesto and whisk until the dough forms into coarse crumbs.
5. Cut the butter into the cracker mixture with a fork or your fingers until the dough forms into a ball.
6. Transfer the dough onto the prepared cookie sheet and spread out the dough thinly until it’s about 1 ½ mm thick. Make sure the thickness is the same throughout so that the crackers bake evenly.
7. Place the pan in the preheated oven and bake for 14-17 minutes until light golden brown in color.
8. Once the dough has finished baking, remove it from the oven.
9. Cut into crackers of the desired size.
Alternatively, you can let it cool and then break it into pieces.
This makes a total of 6 servings of Keto Pesto Crackers. Each serving comes out to be 197 calories, 18.3g fats, 2.7g net carbs, and 5.1g protein.
| NUTRITION | CALORIES | FAT | CARBS | FIBER | NET CARBS | PROTEIN |
| 1 1/4 cup almond flour | 811 | 70 | 30.8 | 18.2 | 12.6 | 29.4 |
| 1/4 teaspoon black pepper | 1 | 0 | 0.3 | 0.1 | 0.2 | 0.1 |
| 1/2 teaspoon salt | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 1/2 teaspoon baking powder | 1 | 0 | 0.6 | 0 | 0.6 | 0 |
| 1/4 teaspoon dried basil | 1 | 0 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0 | 0.1 |
| 1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper | 1 | 0 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0 |
| 1 teaspoon fresh garlic | 4 | 0 | 0.9 | 0.1 | 0.9 | 0.2 |
| 2 tablespoon pesto | 108 | 10.6 | 2 | 0.6 | 1.4 | 1.2 |
| 3 tablespoon butter | 305 | 34.5 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0.4 |
| Totals | 1232 | 115.2 | 35 | 19.2 | 15.8 | 31.3 |
| Per Serving (/6) | 205 | 19.2 | 5.8 | 3.2 | 2.6 | 5.2 |
Keto Pesto Crackers
Ingredients
- 1 ¼ cup almond flour
- ¼ teaspoon black pepper
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon dried basil
- ⅛ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- 1 teaspoon fresh garlic pressed
- 2 tablespoon pesto
- 3 tablespoon butter
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 325F. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper. In a medium bowl, combine the almond flour, pepper, salt, and baking powder. Whisk until smooth.
- Add in the basil, cayenne, and garlic, stirring until evenly combined.
- Next, add in the pesto and whisk until the dough forms into coarse crumbs.
- Cut the butter into the cracker mixture with a fork and combine until the dough forms into a ball.
- Transfer the dough onto the prepared cookie sheet and spread it out thinly, until it's about 1 1/2-mm thick. Try and make the thickness consistent throughout to help the crackers bake evenly.
- Bake for 14–17 minutes or until light golden brown in color.
- Remove from the oven once finished baking.
- Cut the crackers, serve, and enjoy!
I’d make a batch, then grind it up to use it in meat loaves to help hold the meat together (and flavor it too).
My mother used to dip slices of green tomatoes in an egg wash, then saltine cracker crumbs before frying–maybe THESE crackers would work too!
Ooooh! That sounds delicious! I think it might be good in our italian stuffed meatballs!
Do these break apart and crumble if you use them for dipping in things?
Yeah, they should be able to be broken apart. They’re a little fragile, so if you’re looking for dipping recipes, you may want to check out some of the other crackers on the site.
I made these last weekend! The flavor was great but mine came out crumbly, almost “dusty”. Any idea what I may have done wrong? They weren’t crispy at all.
These crackers are a little crumbly in nature. There’s a few other cracker recipes on the site that might be better suited for what you’re looking for. Adding some egg white for binder should help these with structure, though!
These sound lovely, and I look forward to making them. Just one question – what size cup are you using? 240 ml? 250 ml? 200 ml? Heaped, rounded, or level?
I understand using cups as *relative* measures (two parts this, three parts the other, etc), but as an absolute measurement, it seems to be inconsistantly defined.
The flour will weigh 125g total. We use American sized measuring cups, so 300ml total.
Oh no! I hope you enjoy them more next time.
Maybe I missed it, but how many of these make a serving? Thank you!
Hi Brittany, it depends on how large you cut the crackers. Serving size is 1/6th of the dough so you can make big ones, small ones, broken ones – however you want them. 🙂
I am new to all this, so I am still figuring it out. Thank you for your help!
Thank you for the kind words Brittany 🙂
I love this recipe but the crackers are very crumbly once done.. turns to dust in my mouth. Maybe next time I will try adding an egg to keep it together.
Oh no! Sorry to hear that they fell apart on you, if you try it with the egg please let me know how it turns out!
Mine fell apart too and was too dusty as soon as u put in mouth… i handled them as they were my babies :). Anyways i made with egg and turned out great. 1.75 cup almound flour to 1 egg. Nothing else to bind the dough. You can choose your own seasoning
Mine fell apart, too. 🙁 Korri, did you have any luck with the egg? I’m wondering if I rolled them too thin.
The taste is great, but they also fell apart on me. Next time i will try an egg. In the meantime, i am crumbling and using it as a topping to stuffed mushrooms!
These were utterly butterly delicious…I did add an egg as suggested but the almond flour had to be increased to 2 cups (200gms). The rest was according to recipe. The dough was a tad fragile and soft to handle…I made logs and sliced them after freezing for 30 minutes. I got 36 Marie biscuit size crackers. Thank you for a lovely recipe. I was missing the crunch so much.
I used vegan butter and vegan pesto and had the same problem with the crumbling. But they did taste awesome. I’ll see if adding a flax egg to the next batch makes them less fragile.
Mine fell apart. I wish I read the comments about the egg first. 😕
These Were great! My Sisters loved them! They didn’t even taste like they were low carb! they are a little crumbly, but that made them good. I just added an extra tbs of butter, and some garlic juice. I also put fresh chopped basil instead of dried. It made them taste really fresh! Thanks for these great recipes! No need for the extra egg.
How did you cut them and prick them with a fork to get the square crackers in the picture. Did you cut and prick before or after baking?
We cut and pricked them after baking for the photos.