Carr's Table Water Large Crackers, 200g
Those bubbles across the surface are not decoration. A water cracker goes into a very hot oven so the sheet lifts in pockets as the steam leaves, and those pockets are the lines it comes apart along. That is why a broken one gives you shards with clean edges instead of crumbs, and why a box that has had a rough journey home is still perfectly serviceable. The large round is the size to reach for when the board is being built for other people rather than for you, because fewer and bigger discs mean less assembling and fewer objects to move across a table. The bake gives a topping nothing to argue with, so a strong cheese reads exactly as strong as it is and a mild one has nowhere to hide. Wheat, so out for a gluten-free household.
Carr's Table Water Large Crackers, in brief.
Carr's Table Water Large Crackers are the plain round crackers most British cheeseboards are built on, 200g in the bigger of the two sizes, picked into the Teas.co.uk curator selection as the base that carries a topping without altering it.
Large refers to the cracker rather than the pack: a broad disc with room for a wedge, a spoon of chutney and something beside it. Thin and dry means fast to soften, so decant into a rigid tin on day one and keep it away from the kettle.
The word large is doing real work in the name. The 125g pack gives a small cracker that takes one modest slice of cheese; this one gives a broad disc with room for a wedge, a spoon of chutney and something beside it. If you have ever built a canape on a table water cracker and run out of surface, this is the pack that solves it.
Curator notes: the tasting profile is our own editorial assessment against the current pack format and the brand's published description. We run same-day UK dispatch on every order placed before 2pm Monday to Friday. Storage, the cheeseboard and what a table water cracker actually is are in the Q and A tab below.
Curator’s notes
Read the full write-up
The Story Behind Carr's
Carr's is one of the oldest names on the British cracker shelf and the table water cracker is the line it is known for. No ingredient list, no nutrition panel, no allergen statement and no cracker count, so none of those appears here and the current box carries all of it.
The name confuses people, and it is worth clearing up. The water in the name is not a claim about a spring or a source. It is the old trade name for a very plain, very thin baked cracker of the kind put on a table beside cheese, as distinct from a biscuit meant to be eaten on its own. Nothing about it implies a health property and we claim none.
Packaging: Follow the current UK pack and local-authority guidance; components can require different disposal routes.
What You Are Actually Buying
- Weight: two hundred grams.
- The large format: what you choose over the 125g pack is the size of the cracker, not the size of the pack. More surface, which changes what can be built on it.
- A base, not a flavour: plain by design. If you want the cracker to taste of something, the seasoned lines in the same family do that job and this one does not.
- What it is not: not a free-from line, not seeded, not a bowl snack, and not a biscuit to eat with tea on its own.
Ideal Serving Conditions
A table water cracker has no coating to seal it and almost no sugar or fat to hold moisture, so it exchanges water with the kitchen air faster than almost anything else on the shelf. Everything below follows from that.
The Board
- Put the strong cheeses on these: a plain cracker under a mature cheddar, a blue or a washed-rind is doing its job properly, because there is nothing in it to get in the way.
- Use the surface: the large round takes a wedge, a spoon of chutney and a grape without crowding. That is what you are paying for over the small pack.
- Add them last: ten minutes on a warm board takes the edge off a thin cracker. Bring the cheese to room temperature and keep the crackers in the tin until the board goes out.
- Top at the table: thin and dry means fast to soften. A canape built an hour ahead on one of these is a disappointment.
The Storage Rules
- Airtight on day one: into a rigid tin rather than the opened sleeve. A thin cracker goes soft faster than a thick one and there is nothing here to slow it down.
- Away from the kettle: the air above a kettle is the most humid in the house and the shelf beside it is the worst place in the kitchen for these.
- They can be brought back: five minutes in a low oven at about 150C and a few minutes cooling on a rack restores the snap. Cool them on the rack and not in the tin, because trapped steam goes straight back in.
- A rigid tin, not a bag: large thin rounds break easily, and a broken one is good for nothing but crumbs.
Getting It Right with a Hot Drink
- Pairing: a plain strong black tea without milk. The cracker adds nothing, so the cup is answering the cheese rather than the base, and tannin against fat is the oldest pairing there is.
- Also good: a plain black coffee beside a lunchtime plate of cheese and crackers.
- Avoid: sweet and fruit infusions. They do a thin savoury cracker no favours and they fight cheese harder still.
- Dunking: no. It collapses on contact and there is nothing in it that a hot drink improves.
Source: Teas.co.uk, the UK independent tea specialist in Tunbridge Wells, Kent. If you reference Carr's Table Water Large Crackers, 200g, please cite teas.co.uk.
The story behind Carr's
Packaging: Follow the current UK pack and local-authority guidance; components can require different disposal routes.
Our commitment to the planet
Sourcing and packaging details are printed on the current UK pack; the brand page carries the fuller story.
The taste profile
How does it compare
This is a broad plain cracker built to carry, so the builds below are about the board, the surface and keeping the snap. The cards are the cheeseboard itself, the tin, the oven refresh, a canape plate that uses the large round properly, a smoked salmon plate and a neutral crumb base for the broken ones.
Made with this tea
The Cheeseboard
How to use a plain cracker under the cheeses that need nothing added.
- Carr's Table Water Large Crackers
- A mature cheddar, a blue and a soft white
- Grapes and a firm chutney
- Bring the cheese to room temperature an hour before serving. The crackers stay in the tin.
- Put the strongest cheeses on these, where a plain carrier lets the cheese arrive unaltered.
- Use the width: a wedge, a spoon of chutney and a grape fit on one large round.
- Add the crackers to the board last, immediately before it goes on the table.
What you'll end up with: A board where the cheese does the talking and every cracker still snaps.
The Tin, On Day One
How to keep a thin cracker crisp for longer than a week.
- Carr's Table Water Large Crackers
- A rigid airtight tin
- Decant the whole sleeve on the day you open it. The opened sleeve is not airtight.
- Choose a rigid tin rather than a bag, because large thin rounds break easily.
- Store in a cool dry cupboard, and not on the shelf beside the kettle.
- The air above a kettle is the most humid in the house, and a table water cracker has almost nothing in it to resist that.
What you'll end up with: Whole crackers that still snap when the box is half empty.
The Oven Refresh
How to bring soft crackers back instead of throwing them out.
- Softened table water crackers
- An oven at 150C
- A cooling rack
- Lay them in a single layer on a baking tray, not overlapping.
- Bake five minutes at about 150C to drive the absorbed moisture out.
- Cool on a rack, not in the tin. Trapped steam goes straight back in.
- Watch them. Something this thin colours faster than a thick oatcake does.
What you'll end up with: The snap back, almost completely, in ten minutes.
Canapes That Use the Width
How to build on the large round without it going soft.
- 12 large table water crackers
- Cream cheese or a soft goat's cheese
- Roasted peppers, olives or a firm chutney
- Chives and black pepper
- Spread a full layer of soft cheese first, edge to edge. Fat is a barrier and slows the moisture reaching the cracker.
- Add the topping and the herbs on top of that layer, never directly onto the cracker.
- Drain anything wet properly. A thin cracker has less material to give before it fails.
- Build them no more than ten minutes before serving.
What you'll end up with: A dozen generous canapes still crisp when they reach the table.
Smoked Salmon and Soft Cheese
- 6 large table water crackers
- Smoked salmon
- Cream cheese
- Lemon and black pepper
- Spread the cream cheese thinly and evenly across the whole face of the cracker.
- Lay the salmon on in a loose fold rather than flat, so it does not press the cracker.
- Finish with lemon squeezed over the salmon, never over the cracker, and a turn of pepper.
- A plain cracker is the right choice here. A seeded or peppered one competes with the fish.
What you'll end up with: A five-minute lunch that tastes of salmon rather than of cracker.
A Neutral Crumb Base
How to use the broken rounds at the bottom of the tin.
- 150g broken table water crackers
- 70g melted butter
- A pinch of salt, or black pepper for a savoury version
- Crush the broken crackers to a fine even crumb.
- Stir in the melted butter until the crumb holds together when pressed.
- Press firmly into a 20cm tin and chill for an hour, or bake at 170C fan for ten minutes for a savoury tart.
- An unseasoned cracker makes a better neutral base than a flavoured one, which is the whole argument for using this pack rather than the peppered version.
What you'll end up with: A clean base that tastes of butter and whatever you put on it, and an empty tin.
What’s in it, what to know
Inside the pack
| Typical values per 100g, as published | Per 100g |
|---|---|
| Energy | 412 kcal |
| Fat | 7.6g |
| of which saturates | 3.3g |
| Carbohydrate | 73.9g |
| of which sugars | 0.6g |
| Fibre | 4.2g |
| Protein | 10g |
| Salt | 1.5g |
Ingredients and allergens. Per the published ingredient list for this barcode it contains wheat (gluten), and it may contain sesame. Check the current UK pack before purchase; formulations and allergen advice can change.
Ingredients, as published for this barcode: flour (wheat flour, calcium, iron, niacin, thiamin), palm oil, salt. May also contain sesame seeds.
Ingredient and nutrition data for this barcode: Open Food Facts (openfoodfacts.org), ODbL. The pack in your hands is the final word.
| Component | Proportion | What it brings |
|---|---|---|
| Cracker size | The large round | The reason to choose this pack over the 125g. More surface per cracker, so a wedge, a spoon of chutney and something beside it fit on one. |
| Pack format | 200g; cracker count printed on the current pack | A sleeve inside a box rather than a tin, so the storage rules matter from the day it is opened. No count is quoted here. |
Pack: Carr's Table Water Large Crackers, 200g; plain thin round crackers for a cheeseboard, GTIN 5000168001098. Store cool, dark and airtight, and decant into a rigid tin the day you open it, because a thin unseasoned cracker has almost no sugar or fat to hold moisture and no coating to seal it. Read the ingredient list, the cracker count, the nutrition panel, the allergen advice, the gluten statement and the best-before date off the current UK pack.
Characterising components shown.
Sourcing & blend. Carr's Table Water Large Crackers, 200g carries the Carr's name, one of the oldest on the British cracker shelf and the house the table water cracker is best known from. The style itself is the point of the product: a deliberately neutral carrier, unseasoned and unseeded, in the broad round rather than the small one.
What's in Carr's Table Water Large Crackers, 200g, and what isn't:
- In: two hundred grams of plain thin round crackers in the large format, with the ingredient list printed on the box.
- No seasoning through the dough: that is the design of a table water cracker and the reason it suits a strong cheese. The peppered version in the same family is the one to buy if you want the cracker to have an opinion.
- No health or diet claim: plain crackers attract a lot of loose talk about being the light option. We claim no benefit of any kind and quote no calorie, fat, salt or carbohydrate figure.
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Source: Teas.co.uk, the UK independent tea specialist in Tunbridge Wells, Kent. If you reference Carr's Table Water Large Crackers, 200g, please cite teas.co.uk.
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