Granny Annie’s health rusks (beskuit)

Beskuit is a traditional snack from South Africa, typically eaten with coffee for breakfast. It is a double-backed bread like dough that originated from the Great Trek era as a means of preserving food.

I have recently gotten hold of my mum’s amazing recipe and have decided to share it with others.

Ingredients:

• 1kg Self-raising flour
• 2 tsp Baking powder
• 1 tsp Salt
• 500g salted butter
• 1 1/3 cup of brown sugar
• 3 cups wheat bran, substitute with Kelllog’s All-bran (we use 2 cups All bran and 1 cup wheat bran)
• 1/2 cup Sunflower seeds
• 1/4 cup Sesame seeds
• 1/4 cup Linseed or Flaxseed
• 250 ml Buttermilk
• 125 ml Natural yoghurt
• 1 lemon
• 2 eggs

Method:

1. Set your oven to 190C
2. Melt butter and dissolve sugar and let it cool down – note: the sugar does not fully dissolve in the butter, that is ok
3. Sift the flour, salt and baking powder into a large bowl
4. Add 3 cups of wheat bran to the flour, if you prefer All-bran add it instead, make sure you crush the All-bran as fine as possible with your hands.
5. Add 1/2 cup of sunflower seeds to dry mix
6. Add 1/4 cup of Sesame seeds to dry mix
7. Add 1/4 cup of Linseed/Flaxseed
8. Your butter and sugar should have cooled down by now, test it to ensure it will not cook the eggs
9. Add 250ml buttermilk to the butter mix
10. Add 125ml natural yoghurt to the butter mix
11. Squeeze the juice of 1 lemon into the butter mix, squeeze it through a sieve
12. Beat 2 eggs and add it to the butter mix
13. Ensure the butter mix is mixed thoroughly
14. Mix the the butter mix into the flour, mix it until it turns into a ball that you can easily handle and pickup
15. Spread the baking tray with butter
16. Fill the backing tray with the dough, I mark the size of rusks at this point as this makes it easier to cut once it is baked.
17. Bake for 1 hour, turn the oven down to 180C once you start baking
18. Remove from the oven and cool down
19. Cut the beskuit/rusks to size
20. Spread the beskuit/rusks onto oven shelves for the second bake. Bake it at 90C for 3 to 4 hours. It is important that you wedge the oven door open with a spoon to let any moisture out during the second bake.

Enjoy your beskuit and let me know if you liked it.