Anzac Biscuits for ANZAC Day

This post here by Kirsty, an Australian woman living in France, at You had me at bonjour really touched and moved me this morning. I considered typing a post consisting of my thoughts on this occasion, and it would have been a fabulous post, but my brain just wasn't up for wrapping itself around an essay today. I felt the need to make a more tactile, physical, domestic gesture.

And so, to the kitchen, and to the baking of Anzac biscuits.

My recipe comes from the P.W.M.U. Cookery Book, first published 1904. My copy, pictured here, is a 1971 reprint passed down to me from a great-aunt. This was the cookbook in my home when I was growing up. I have doubled all the quantities given, because one batch is just not enough.

4 cups rolled oats
2 cups flour
1 cup sugar
1 cup melted butter
2 tbsp golden syrup
2 tsp bicarb soda
4 tbsp boiling water

Mix oats, flour, sugar and melted butter, then the syrup, and lastly the soda dissolved in water.

Drop by spoonful onto baking trays. Bake in moderate oven 15-20 mins.

An offering in honour of those who fell, and those who lived to remember.
Lest we forget.