Anzac Biscuits
Anzac biscuits make a regular (but not very long-lasting!) appearance in our baking tins and they keep very well. This recipe is only in grams (rather than grams and cups) as I scale it up and down on a regular basis. These measurements make 24 but are easily doubled or quadrupled… or transferred to kilos (I once parcelled up 360 and sent them to the ship’s company of HMNZS Te Mana who were spending Anzac Day in Vietnam).
Servings: 24 biscuits
Ingredients
- 150 grams plain flour
- 115 grams sugar
- 140 grams oats see note below
- 100 grams desiccated coconut not sweetened
- 100 grams butter
- 50 grams golden syrup see note below
- 60 mls boiling water see note below
- 7.5 grams (1 ½ teaspoons) baking soda
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 170˚c and line 2 baking trays with baking paper.
- In a large bowl, mix together flour, sugar, oats and coconut.
- In a small bowl, melt the butter and golden syrup. I zap mine in the microwave until the butter is melted (about 1 minute). Stir well.
- In another small bowl, stir together the boiling water and baking soda until the baking soda has dissolved.
- Add the water/baking soda into the melted butter, give it a quick stir, and then tip the whole lot into the dry ingredients and mix really well. There should be no pockets of dry flour left so keep mixing until well combined. See note below about the consistency of the mixture as this recipe is quite a bit wetter than the usual.
- Wet your hands and take a ping-pong ball-sized lump of dough, roll it into a ball-ish shape and pop it on your prepared tray. Each ball should be about 35 grams. Repeat with remaining mixture (re-wetting your hands as you go so the dough doesn’t stick).
- Arrange the balls with at least 5cm between them (they will spread as they bake) and press down lightly with wet fingers.
- Bake each tray for 12-5 minutes. They are ready with they are dark golden brown. Cool on trays for 5 minutes before removing to wire racks to cool completely. Store in an airtight container for up to one week. They will keep much longer than a week but will lose the crispy edges after this time.
Notes
Oats – I use whole oats but you can also use oatmeal (just not fine ground oats).
Golden syrup – this is a thick syrupy sugar byproduct that is readily found in NZ, Australia and the UK. It is harder to find the US but can be found online and in speciality food stores. Don’t substitute corn syrup as it doesn’t have the distractive golden syrup flavour needed for these biscuits.
Water/Consistency – this recipe makes a wetter mixture than the traditional Edmonds Anzac Biscuit. I’m not a fan of doughy biscuits so have adjusted the recipe to give crispy edges and chewy centres. This means the mixture is wetter and softer than usual and you will need to use wet hands to shape the balls of dough (or it will stick something chronic). If you prefer your Anzac Biscuits chunkier, reduce the water to 40 mls.