Anzac Biscuit recipe

[reynardo]

By request
Pre-heat oven to 160C and grease or line 2 cookie trays.

- 1 cup plain flour
- 1 cup rolled oats
- 1 cup sugar
- 3/4 cup dessicated coconut

Mix these dry ingredients together in a large bowl

In a saucepan melt
- 125g butter and
- 2 tablespoons of golden syrup

In a cup mix
- 2 tablespoons boiling water and
- 1.5 teaspoons baking soda,
then add to saucepan butter/syrup mix.

Then pour this fluffy fizzing mix into the dry ingredients, and mix well until everything is moist. If it is a little too dry, add another tablespoon boiling water. A 2.5 cm diameter ball should hold together nicely.

Try not to eat too much mix at this point.

Put dessert-spoon sized blobs onto the baking trays, spacing so that as the mixture spreads out it doesn't stick to all the other ones around.

Bake for 20 minutes or until golden brown. Cool down on a wire frame. Be warned - this is the point when most biscuits will disappear mysteriously. I am going to be generous and assume it's evaporation.

Be prepared to make another batch fairly soon afterwards.

Substitutions:
For golden syrup, which is a rich sugar syrup, use light treacle or if desperate, 50% corn syrup 50% maple.
Baking Soda is also known as Saleratus, Bicarbonate of Soda or cooking soda. It is not Baking Powder.
Using shredded coconut instead of dessicated makes a slightly drier biscuit which looks like it has tentacles coming out of it.

Comments

[panacea1.livejournal.com]

I'm just trying to get a mental reference for the viscosity of golden syrup, since if I were going to do this recipe I'd probably just make a boiled sugar syrup rather than going out for corn syrup or trying to use molasses (which would be too dark and has a strong flavor anyway).

Since neither golden syrup nor treacle are common around here and last I checked we didn't have any corn syrup in the house...

[silmaril.livejournal.com]

Nnnnnmm Mmmmmmm.

Forwarded to friends, adding to recipe memories.

[nefaria.livejournal.com]

> Using shredded coconut instead of dessicated makes a slightly drier
> biscuit which looks like it has tentacles coming out of it.
Do they come alive, and if so, how much to ship a dozen to Buzzy?

And I still say it's not a biscuit unless you cover it with gravy before you eat it.

[shadow-5tails.livejournal.com]

Gravy.

You folks in Forn Parts are WEEEEEIIIRD!

*grin*

Bikkits!

[shadow-5tails.livejournal.com]

*CTRL-C*

*CTRL-V* I think I did this to your husband a couple of days ago... *hug*

So does this make for crispy crunchy Anzacs or the squishier sort? I've never been able to work out what makes the difference on that front.

Re: Bikkits!

[reynardo.livejournal.com]

I think the crispier ones are left in the oven a little longer. Also, I used the shredded coconut so ended up with thicker biscuits, which are chewy. Hang on a bit while I conduct some tests to determine...

[qamar.livejournal.com]

Thank you for posting this!! Rock.

Re: Bikkits!

[shadow-5tails.livejournal.com]

I've never been sure whether it was a question of time, temperature, relative proportions of ingredients, or some combination of the above; they tend to be somewhat gloopy still when you get them out of the oven and solidify/harden on cooling, so I've never had much luck judging that.

I was going to cook Anzac biscuits at the old house a couple of weeks ago. Or maybe last week. Either way, it's good to have a trusted recipe to work from...

Re: Bikkits!

[reynardo.livejournal.com]

Actually, to tell the truth, there's a little too much sugar in it. And the recipies on the web seem to vary an awful lot. Let me do some more tests...

[shadow-5tails.livejournal.com]

Heh. I need to pack up the appropriate ingredients from OldHouse so that I can experiment myself. Or get better at stealing bikkits from 850km away... *grin*

Re: Bikkits!

[panacea1.livejournal.com]

We're interested in the results. I'm still trying to figure out the difference between "dessicated" and "shredded" coconut so I can hunt down the comparable product here (knowing that we're going to have to come up with a reasonable substitute for golden syrup already, I want to get as close as possible with the other ingredients.)

Do you mean the stuff that's shredded fine and sweetened, shredded fine and not sweetened, flaked and sweetened, flaked and not sweetened, or something else entirely?

Re: Bikkits!

[reynardo.livejournal.com]

Dessicated coconut is close to the texture of breadcrumbs. Shredded coconut looks like someone fed the coconut bits through a paper shredded (a fairly fine one, but still longish strips of coconut meat instead of fine coconut almost-dust).

Test 2 shows that only 3/4 cup sugar works very nicely and is still sweet enough.

Test 3 coming up.

Re: Bikkits!

[panacea1.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Sounds like a format that isn't usual for here. Could probably get the right shape by taking shredded coconut and pulsing it in the food processor a few times to chop up the tentacles. Is what you use normally sweetened (and therefore a little moist) or unsweetened (and therefore a little crunchy or crispy)? Am assuming one wouldn't use toasted since it would toast nicely during the baking of the biscuits.

Re: Bikkits!

[reynardo.livejournal.com]

As far as I know, the stuff we buy is 100% coconut, no sweetners.

The tentacle stuff has worked nicely this time, though. Looks a little strange, but tastes fine.

Re: Bikkits!

[harliquinn.livejournal.com]

Coconut Tentacles ....

AHEM. Anyway, I'm tempted to try this for the holidays with Wheat free and Vegan/Wheat free butter substitutions. I'll let you know if I don't burn down the flat. I think I've seen dessicated coconut at the local Indian/Pakistani Grocery ....

Curious if this would work also with part maple syrup, part Agave syrup to lower the sugar levels a bit.