ANZAC biscuit bake-off

New Zealand and Australia commemorated ANZAC Day this past Wednesday. After the Dawn Parade, I decided to bake some ANZAC cookies. I had seen advertising for the Chelsea Golden Syrup ANZAC recipe, so I decided to try it. Then, I decided it would be interesting to do a bit of an ANZAC biscuit bake-off. Pit two recipes against each other to find the best ANZAC biscuit. The obvious choice for the second recipe was the Edmonds Cookbook recipe.

The Chelsea recipe can be found here. I stuck to the classic recipe and didn't add sunflower seeds, although I really like the idea of adding seeds for extra crunch.

These ANZAC cookies were really, really tasty, but they were not how I consider a traditional ANZAC cookie should be. They were the texture of a brandy snap, I think due to the really high sugar content. So they were super crispy and crunchy. They also spread so that they were super flat.

The Edmonds recipe is similar, but does not contain as much sugar.

1/2 c flour
1/3 c sugar
2/3 c coconut
3/4 c rolled oats
50g butter
1 T golden syrup
1/2 t baking soda
2 T boiling water

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. Mix together the flour, sugar, coconut and rolled oats. Melt butter and golden syrup. Dissolve baking soda in boiling water and add to butter and golden syrup. Stir butter mixture into the dry ingredients. Place spoonfuls onto cold greased trays and flatten gently. Bake for about 15 mins, or until golden.

These were delicious. The right amount of crunchy, soft and chewy. Not too sweet. There really was no comparison between the two. One flat and crunchy and one soft and chewy.

The moral of the story? You can always count on Edmonds.