Where does it fit into your culinary repertoire (if at all)?
I like them with peanut butter, butter, cheddar cheese slices, and crumbled into soup or chili. I would like to learn some new ways to love them.
Do you have a preferred brand? I don’t, except that I want the original salted-- not salt-free, fat free, herb-flavored, or any other twisted iteration that someone can invent.
For those of you who remember the Generic packaging craze of the early 80s where things came in packages/cans/bottles with a plain black and white label, the generic saltines were great. They were a little browner and toastier than the brand-name crackers.
Are there saltines in other countries (I never go anywhere)?
Saltines have near cousins: the pilot biscuit and those little crackers that are supposed to go in chowder. (Those guys can be made into a compelling snack by tossing a whole bag first with a bit of olive oil to make them sticky and then with ranch dressing powder. Yum.)
I love them with the oil (but not olive, just a little corn or canola, for minimal added flavor) and ranch! Have to make them every year around Christmas.
As for plain saltines, I always forget about them but they are great with cheddar cheese slices or spread, or with butter.
Oyster crackers for Chili and Chowder. All other soups get crushed saltines. Any spread, cheese, summer sausage, etc. gets a “fancy” cracker like a Ritz. Occasionally I’ll put Chicken Salad on a Saltine because it reminds me of my childhood.
They used to serve saltines at my daughter’s after school program. Except they served the unsalted ones. So she called them “tines” (teens), since they had no salt. Always thought that was clever.
I’ve discovered the round ones. For some reason I like those best
We used to eat them plain, out of the wax paper sleeve. My brother used put catsup on them. He’s a weenie-head, though.
That reminds me Vienna sausages are good with saltines.
I like them with chili, although cornbread is my first choice there. I make peanut butter crackers with them sometimes, They sometimes hit the spot if I don’t feel very well but want a little something. I crush them up and use them as the binder to make salmon patties.
I remember seeing recipes for toffee candy made with them. I have never done it but this might interest you since you’re looking in to new uses. Google “toffee recipe crackers” if this interests you.
I don’t have anything exciting to add. I could eat an entire sleeve with peanut butter and a big glass of milk. Every day. For eternity (as long as there’s always milk).
Saltines are okay–not in my cracker top 10 list, but they’re perfectly fine with just about any topping. I seem to remember them being offered up as a digestive aid for upset stomachs when I was a kid.
I like them with butter, but you have to stack them three high when you eat them: cracker, butter, cracker, butter, cracker (hey, them’s the rules; I don’t make 'em up). I also like them with both butter and peanut butter at the same time.
I do like saltines, but I almost never have them around. If I have crackers, it’s usually a Ritz-type cracker I have but 90% of the time, you’re not going to find crackers in my house. We’re just not really cracker eaters around here. But either of those with a smear of liverwurst on them. Yumm!!!
My father taught me to eat them with vanilla ice cream topped with chocolate sauce. If the ice cream is soft, use the saltines as a scoop. Otherwise, spoon it onto the cracker.
