flapjacks

These are, I should start off by saying, a flapjack of the most British kind.

I know across various ponds that a flapjack is a type of pancake. While I am a big proponent of pancakes, these are quite obviously something different. I suppose they most closely resemble a granola bar; various type of oats are mixed with butter and sugar and a touch of golden syrup and baked until firm. Flapjacks can be chewy or crisp depending on your preference, ratio of ingredients and baking time.

These flapjacks fall somewhere in the middle I suppose. Although I like to underbake them slightly so there is still a bit of a chew to them, they also contain cornflakes and sunflower seeds to provide some added texture. The cornflake idea I saw once in Tom Norrington-Davies' book, Just Like Mother Used to Make, which is one of my most food-splattered cookbooks. The toasted sunflower seeds I added because, frankly, I'm trying to use them up in as many possible recipes as I can. It's amazing how long a relatively small bag of sunflower seeds can last...

Sometimes I think that my boyfriend tires of my endless culinary experiments (although he hasn't yet seen what I've got in store for this weekend...) but these were a roaring success when I made them a couple of weeks ago. Boyfriend went so far as to designate a particular time of the day as 'flapjack o'clock' (4:30pm for reference) and we had to stop what we doing at that time every day so that we could eat a flapjack.  

Incidentally, I had removed all of the flapjacks from the tin before I decided that actually I wanted to take some pictures of them in situ.  I was then presented with what was essentially a giant flapjack jigsaw puzzle and spent a happy half hour trying to work out how all the pieces fitted back in the tin. Therefore not only do you get a tasty tea time treat if you make these but you also get a fun game for the whole family. I do spoil you sometimes.

~

Flapjacks

Yield: Approx 25 flapjacks

Ingredients

• 40g (1/4 cup) sunflower seeds
• 130g (1 1/2 cups) porridge oats
• 170g (2 cups) jumbo oats
• 125g (1 stick + 1 tablespoon) unsalted butter, softened
• 125g (2/3 cup) light brown soft sugar
• 40g (1 1/2 cups) cornflakes
• 1 pinch of salt
• 3 - 4 tablespoons golden syrup (or other liquid sweetener)

Cooking Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F. Grease a 23cm square baking tin with butter.
2. Over a low heat, toast the sunflower seeds in a dry pan for a couple of minutes until they are a light golden brown. Set aside to cool.
3. In a large bowl, combine the oats, cornflakes, sunflower seeds, butter, sugar and salt with a wooden spoon or with your hands.
4. Add enough golden syrup to bring all the ingredients together into a sticky mound of goodness.
5. Press the mixture into your baking tin and bake for 25-30 minutes until firm (a shorter cooking time will give you a chewier flapjack). Allow to cool in the tin before slicing into squares.

PS - for those who don't know their porridge oats from their jumbo oats, I found a handyish guide here.