Chocolate Flapjack

Flapjack is one of those sweet treats that I think of as a classically British tray bake. There are only a few ingredients required, they are quick to make and serve as a delicious snack for children and adults alike, but for some reason, I very rarely bake them. Maybe this will change as our family grows and we have little mouths to feed. I am sure my desire to bake won't disappear, but I am also sure that the amount of time I have to spend on a recipe will greatly diminish. So I am sure I will be reaching for this kind of quick recipe far more in the future.

A few weeks ago, I couldn't get the idea of flapjack out of my head. They needed to be baked, and they needed to have chocolate in it. Flapjack is perfectly delicious without chocolate, but on this occasion, it felt like a necessity. I remember my Mum making these when we were children, and I especially loved it when she added chocolate chips into the mix. I would always hope that I would get to eat the piece of flapjack that looked like it had the most chocolate in it. Chocolate makes a lot of things better, in my humble opinion.  This recipe uses cocoa rather than chocolate chips, but you could easily add chocolate chips into the mix if you fancied, or omit the cocoa and have plain and simple flapjack. Often with baking, you need to be precise with your measurements for the recipe to work, but with flapjack, there is a lot of room for throwing in any added extras you like - fruit, nuts, chocolate - so long as you keep the basic ingredients simple and steady - butter, sugar and oats.

Chocolate Flapjacks

ingredients

350g (3sticks) unsalted butter

175g (almost 1 cup) soft brown sugar

175g  (almost 1 cup) muscovado sugar

450g (5 cups) rolled oats

3 tbsp golden syrup

6 tbsp cocoa 

method

1) Pre-heat oven to 140C / gas mark 2 / 275F Grease a 7 x 11" baking tray or roasting tin

2) Melt the butter, syrup and sugars in a saucepan over a gentle heat.

3) Mix in the oats and cocoa

4) Tip the mixture into the greasted baking tray and bake for 20 minutes. They will still look moist after 20 minutes - this is fine and good.

5) Remove from the oven and leave to cool in the pan for about 20 minutes before slicing up. If you slice them too early, they will crumble and not hold their shape.

How to tell if flapjack is baked

Moisture

I have found that there is a little bit of learning to be done when it comes to telling if flapjacks are ready or not. On a few occasions, I have made the mistake of thinking they look far too moist, even once they have had the suggested baking time, and cooked them for longer. This will leave you with crunchy, hard flapjack instead of a lovely chewy texture.

Bubbles

If you notice the mixture starting to bubble, remove it immediately from the oven. Ideally, you want to avoid bubbling, as this is an indicator that the flapjack is losing its moisture and heading towards crunchiness. If you like your flapjack crunchy, then keep baking it a little longer!

Movement

If you check your flapjacks after 20 minutes and they look like they would slide around the pan if you tipped it, they probably need another 5 minutes or so. A little bit of movement (think very gentle flapjack landslide) is fine.