easy baking

Ugly lockdown baking: Flapjacks

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The cupboards are almost bare, and I’ve intentionally been whittling down their contents to this barren state. I am cautioned that this is the behavior of someone expecting an apocalypse. I’m not. But I am clearing out the stuff that’s been occupying space for much too long, and which no longer has much function. When I used to bake industrial amounts of cakes and cookies, I had a lot of use for bulk stores of sugar and baking soda. Not so now.

Although oats are something I will continue to use, replenishing them frequently isn’t a terrible idea. Thinking of oats, and flapjacks, I can’t help but think of the iconic packaging for Scott’s Porage Oats.

scotts

I wrote in another recent baking post about watching a show that featured a visit to the astounding Tate & Lyle sugar refinery (it’s rather scary to think about the amount of sugar consumed in the world)… as stated, I’m working my way through ingredients that have been in my cupboards for a long time but need to be used, including several containers of Lyle’s Golden Syrup. There are pretty much no better uses for golden syrup (and oats!) than ANZAC biscuits or the very basic flapjack.

Very simple flapjacks

295 grams unsalted butter
250 grams golden syrup
500 grams rolled porridge oats
pinch of salt

Prepare an 8×8 pan – butter the pan and line with parchment for easy lifting out of the pan. Preheat oven to 180C (160C if you have a fan) or 350F.

Combine butter and syrup in a saucepan; stir together until melted. Add oats and salt. Mix well. Press mixture evenly into pan. Bake about 25 minutes (until top is golden). Leave in the pan for 30 minutes, lift out and let cool completely on a wire rack.

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Cut into squares once cooled. Like many such… rustic goods… they aren’t pretty, but that says nothing about what they taste like.

 

caramel popcorn

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Caramel popcorn is something my mother has made my entire life. She joked with her colleagues that most days she’d serve popcorn for dinner, but caramel corn was for payday. Later I made this for all the birthday/slumber parties and the like.

The recipe came from a cookbook one of her aunts published. Since leaving home, I never make it because it’s too sweet, I can’t easily find white popcorn in Sweden, didn’t have a hot-air popper, and the original recipe calls for corn syrup.

But suddenly I had white corn, a hot-air popper and golden syrup and the ability to give the finished product away.

It’s not difficult. Here’s the recipe.

Caramel popcorn
Preheat oven to 125C

Pop about 1/2 a cup of popcorn in a hot-air popper directly into a baking dish/roasting pan

In a heavy-bottomed stovetop pot:
1/2 cup butter
1 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup corn syrup or golden syrup
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon vanila

(You can also double this recipe, as my family usually did – and use a very large roasting pan.)

Melt butter, add the brown sugar and syrup on low-medium heat. Bring to a boil, stir constantly. Let boil 5 minutes without stirring.

Remove from heat. Stir in baking soda and vanilla. The mixture will get very foamy and lightly caramel colored.

Pour over the popcorn and stir to coat. Bake in preheated oven. Stir corn every 15 minutes, turning pan halfway through, for about 45 mins to 1 hour. It should be crispy once it cools off a bit.