anzac.

saturday night is our engagement cocktail party! i'm so so so excited - it is going to be a great opportunity for our london guests to meet each other, and for us to celebrate with some of our dearest the journey toward marriage! making it even better is a quick trip over the pond by marvellous. i cannot wait.

i'm taking the opportunity to craft my way to heaven - and cook up a storm. i LOVE entertaining, and simply cannot wait until we have our own place. le boy and i have established one of our key values to be hospitality and we are hoping to be able to open our home and our lives to others.

the engagement party is proving a great opportunity to try out some decor and theme ideas for the wedding - our colours are navy and deep pink and our theme is 'a bicycle built for two.' le boy is an enormous cycling enthusiast and so it's apropos.

we're also trying to keep our food choices authentic to the food we love and to our home nations. and so i present the 'anzac' biscuit. the story goes that these biscuits were baked by wives of WWI soldiers because the biscuits could withstand the long journey by sea to the war in europe. consequently, they are a very dense, crisp biscuit, and have no major perishable ingredients. we plan to serve them with a topping of vanilla ice cream as a 'finishing' to the evening of champagne, hor d'ouvres, and immense excitement.

anzac biscuits  (adapted from donnahay.com.au)  1 cup (90g) rolled oats  1 cup (150g) plain (all-purpose) flour  ⅓ cups (150g) caster (superfine) sugar  ¾ cup (60g) desiccated coconut  2 tablespoons golden syrup  125g butter  1 teaspoon bicarbonate of (baking) soda  2 tablespoons hot water   Preheat oven to 160°C (320ºF). Mix the oats, flour, sugar and coconut in a bowl. Place the golden syrup and butter in a saucepan over low heat and melt. Mix the bicarbonate of soda with the water and add to the butter mixture. Add to the dry ingredients and mix well. Place tablespoons of the mixture, leaving space between each one for spreading, onto baking trays lined with non-stick baking paper and flatten to about 7cm in diameter. Bake for 8–10 minutes or until a deep brown. Cool on trays for 5 minutes, then transfer to wire racks to cool completely. Makes 28.