In Canada a flapjack is another name for a pancake. Here in the UK, it’s a sort of baked oat square. Similar to a granola bar, a good flapjack is chewy and dense and sweet with golden syrup.
The first flapjack I tasted was not good – in fact, it was a huge disappointment. While it looked tempting enough in the sandwich shop with its generous coating of chocolate, it tasted of nothing but cheap oil and sugar, compacted itself into my molars and left a coating of grease on the roof of my mouth. I didn’t finish it – or buy another flapjack for a good ten years. Once we had the girls, I started encountering homemade flapjacks at birthday parties and bake sales and discovered how tasty they can be. Perfect for packed lunches, I now make them regularly.
At first I was taken aback by the amount of butter and syrup most flapjack recipes call for. But after experimenting with various healthier recipes (including one that involved mashed banana), I’ve settled on this lemon and ginger version. I just cut them into smaller pieces.
Avoid overbaking flapjacks. They are ready when the surface is just firm to the touch, with a little bit of give. Flapjacks harden quite a lot, and what seems a nice chewy flapjack when you take it out of the oven can cool into a tooth cracking hunk of concrete.
Lemon-ginger flapjacks
- 175g butter
- 175g brown sugar
- 175g golden syrup
- 350g rolled oats
- 1 tsp ground ginger
- zest of a lemon
- 1/2 tsp salt
- Preheat oven to 325°F (160°C). Lightly grease an 8″ square (or rectangular) baking tin.
- In a medium-sized pot, heat the butter, brown sugar and golden syrup, stirring until everything is melted together. Remove from the heat.
- Combine with the oats, ginger, lemon zest and salt and pack into the baking tin.
- Cook for about twenty minutes, or until just firm.
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