iRelle

Friday’s post is supposed to give you, the reader, a glimpse into any project-y type things that I, the blogger, might have going on – Usually I have something in the way of a digital art project, or maybe a creative writing piece that I’m working on, and sometimes more tactile things like off-the-page papercraft projects. This week, however, I’m at a loose end. The time I would normally spend doing these things has been spent getting this site up and lookin’ good. Since what I’ve done here pretty much speaks for itself, I’ve decided to write about something that took up an hour or so of my time this afternoon – baking ANZAC bikkies.

I love cooking. No wait, I like cooking. It’s baking that I love. Baking in our house seems to go by trends – some of them with reason, some without. In early Autumn, we have a spurt of apple-based recipes… yuko’s slice, apple tea cake, apple crumble. Early this year I went cupcake crazy for a while, (until a rather overenthusiastic batch of vegan chocolate chip muffins turned wrong). We have periods of Derby slice, long dry patches when we make do with shop-bought sawdust, and bouts of chocolate chip cookies. At the moment, though, we’re in an ANZAC biscuit cycle – following my disastrous attempt to introduce our taste buds to something different, something new: peanut butter and banana cookies.

So this afternoon I made ANZACS. They have to be one of the top recipes as far as fun goes! I love melting the butter and golden syrup together, stirring the bi-carb soda in and watching it fizz, and the clash of textures as that soft, fluffy mixture is stirred into the flour, coconut, sugar and oats. Putting biscuits out onto the tray is probably my least favourite part (no wait, that would be the dishes.) but with ANZACS it’s not usually as tedious. You can throw the mixture onto the trays and hope for the best.

My family likes their ANZACS chewy, not crunchy, and the recipe we use generally yields that sweet, melt-in-your mouth bikkie that goes perfectly with a glass of milk or a cup of tea.