Gluten Free Anzac Biscuits – No Oats!

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All the rich, golden flavour of a classic Anzac biscuit with a gluten free twist. These 100% gluten free Anzac Biscuits are also oat free, and egg free too!

When it comes to quintessential Kiwi (and Aussie) recipes, Anzac biscuits have to be right up there towards the top of the list, right?

Because no one should have to miss out, I’m sharing with you my recipe for these gluten and oat free Anzac biscuits. These are as close as they can possibly be to the traditional recipe, while making them completely gluten free and Coeliac-safe.

While there is still a little bit of discussion about whether the biscuits that the ANZAC wives sent to their husbands during WWI were the version we make today, with rolled oats and coconut, or whether they may have been a bit more like a Gingernut biscuit, the traditionally accepted recipe that we all know and love is a firm favourite on both sides of the Tasman.

While they’re popular to make each year on the 25th of April for Anzac Day commemorations, they’re a great recipe to have on hand all year round.

Before we talk any more about the recipe, we need to talk about the oaty elephant in the room.

Can You Make Anzac Biscuits Without Oats?

If you’ve ever had a traditional Anzac biscuit, you’ll know – oats are one of the main ingredients. But, in New Zealand and Australia, oats are not recommended to be consumed as part of a gluten-free diet for people with Coeliac disease.

There are a couple of reasons for this, the first is that most oats are potentially contaminated with other gluten-containing cereals (wheat, barley, etc.) during growing, harvesting and processing. The other is that oats contain a protein called avenin, which, in some people, can trigger the same symptoms that gluten does.

I have more information about oats and my choice not to have any recipes containing oats on Gluten Free Kiwi Favourites in my “Are oats gluten free?” post.

I do have a recipe for gluten free Anzac biscuits with oats on my other website, Sweetness and Bite, that I used to make before my Dad stopped eating oats, and I do have an oat-free variation of that recipe using quinoa flakes. But here’s the thing – while quinoa flakes are the most similar product in terms of looks and texture, they do have a very, very strong quinoa taste that not everyone likes.

So what can we use instead? Am I going to send you out to buy some strange and hard-to-find ingredients? Nope, it’s easy, we’re using… gluten-free cornflakes!

When crushed to a similar size to oats, the cornflakes provide the same bulk and a similar texture to oats, but they don’t add any flavour to the biscuits, meaning that the traditional golden-syrupy, brown sugar-y Anzac biscuit taste shines through.

You do need to make sure you buy gluten free cornflakes – many brands of cornflakes add malt barley flavouring, which is not safe for Coeliacs. You’ll usually find the gluten free cornflakes in the gluten free aisle at the supermarket.

Update: You can also make these using gluten free Weet-Bix instead of cornflakes! It results in a texture a little more similar to the traditional Anzac biscuit, although the flavour isn’t quite as strongly Anzac biscuit because the flavour of the Weet-bix makes the biscuits taste a little nuttier than the cornflake version. But if you like GF Weet-bix, or want a biscuit with a little more fibre, then the Weet-bix version is a great option.

Because it makes for a less traditional biscuit, and because the recipe needed to be tweaked slightly from this one, I have given them their own post – Gluten Free Weet-Bix Biscuits.

Scroll down to the recipe card for the full ingredients list and printable recipe, or keep reading for ingredient tips and process photos.

Gluten & Oat Free Anzac Biscuit Ingredients:

We’ll be using gluten free flour in these biscuits, of course, but the rest of the ingredients are 100% true to the original Anzac biscuit recipe:

Gluten Free Flour – As usual, I used my favourite homemade gluten free flour blend, but you can use a premade blend if you prefer. Different flours may affect the texture of the finished biscuits, so if your biscuits don’t spread enough or spread too much, it is likely a result of using a different flour. I have tested the recipe using Edmonds gluten free plain flour, and it works well in this recipe.
Gluten Free Cornflakes – We talked about these above, but again, make sure you’re buying gluten free cornflakes.
Desiccated Coconut – This is finely shredded coconut. If you can’t get it, then you could blitz some shredded (thread) coconut in a food processor.
Brown Sugar – I like to use brown sugar as it is slightly acidic and it helps prevent too much spreading of the biscuits (and it contributes even more to the golden syrup-y flavour). You can use regular white sugar if you prefer, but your biscuits will likely spread more, so keep that in mind when portioning and spacing the biscuits.
Baking Soda
Butter – Either salted or unsalted butter is fine.
Golden Syrup – My preference is Chelsea golden syrup in the tin, as it is thicker and has more flavour. But the squeeze-bottle version will also work.

Ok, now we’ve covered that, let’s talk about making the biscuits!

How to Make Gluten Free Anzac Biscuits

First off, you’ll need to crush the cornflakes. You can do this in a food processor if you prefer, but I like to use a good old-fashioned snaplock bag and a rolling pin. As long as you’re gentle, you can save the bag and reuse it next time.

You’re aiming to crush them to around the same size as rolled oats.

After that, it’s basically a melt-and-mix biscuit dough. Easy as.

You’ll start by mixing together the dry ingredients. Then the butter, golden syrup and some water are melted together, either on the stove or in the microwave.

Once it’s hot, stir in the baking soda, let it get fizzy, and then mix it into the dry ingredients.

Then you can roll the dough into balls. It’ll be a little bit crumbly, which is ok, but if it’s too crumbly, you can add a splash of water or a little more melted butter to help it come together. Because gluten-free flours absorb different amounts of liquids, sometimes you just need to add a little more moisture.

Flatten the balls of dough, then pop ’em in the oven to bake.

You can choose whether you want chewy or crunchy Anzac biscuits by altering the baking time. Bake a little less for chewy and a little longer for crunchy.

When the biscuits come out of the oven, I like to use the “cookie scoot” trick that I learnt from Cloudy Kitchen, which makes the biscuits nicely round. You can skip this step if you don’t care about round biscuits; they taste the same either way!

But if you do want them to be round, simply grab a round cookie cutter that’s just a little bit bigger than the biscuits, then as soon as they come out of the oven, pop the cutter over the top and swirl it around to round off the edges.

Exactly how long the biscuits will keep for is a tricky thing for me to say, because we tend to eat them all pretty quickly in this house. But they should last a good 2 weeks at least in an airtight container, likely even longer.

If you’re a crunchy Anzac biscuit fan and have baked them until crisp, they do tend to lose their crispness over time. If that happens, you can pop them back in the oven on low heat (100°C) for ten minutes or so to dry them out and crisp them back up.

I have, on more than one occasion, consumed these for breakfast using the reasoning that it’s basically cereal in biscuit form.

But whether you’re eating them for breakfast, or for morning or afternoon tea with a nice cuppa, there’s no denying that these are a huge favourite in many Kiwi and Aussie households.

Are you new to gluten-free baking?

Or just need some tips on how to make the most of the recipes on GFKF? Check out my start guide to learn how to bake safely and successfully gluten free.

Allergen safety ✔️ Gluten free flour info ✔️
Accurate measuring ✔️ Tools + Equipment ✔️

More Gluten Free Biscuit Recipes:

• Gluten Free Chocolate Chip Biscuits – Delicious vanilla biscuits stuffed with chocolate chips.
• Gluten Free Chocolate Biscuits – For those times when only the most chocolatey biscuit will do.
• Gluten Free Gingernut Biscuits – Spicy ginger biscuits with that classic hard/crunchy texture, that won’t dissolve into your cupa when you dunk it!

Gluten Free Oat Free Anzac Biscuits

Delicious Anzac biscuits made 100% gluten free. Naturally egg free, and made with gluten free cornflakes instead of oats – these biscuits have all delicious flavour of a traditional Anzac biscuit.

4.8 from 31 votes

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Prep Time: 10 minutes minutes

Cook Time: 30 minutes minutes

Total Time: 40 minutes minutes

Author: Natalie | Gluten Free Kiwi Favourites

Makes: 22 large biscuits

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Ingredients

• 260 g gluten free flour, see notes
• 180 g brown sugar
• 75 g desiccated coconut
• 100 g gluten free cornflakes
• 125 g salted butter
• 100 g golden syrup
• 1 Tablespoon water
• ½ teaspoon baking soda

Instructions

• Heat the oven to 160°C and line 2 – 3 baking trays with baking paper.
• Sift the gluten-free flour into a large bowl. Add the brown sugar and desiccated coconut. Stir to combine, breaking up any lumps of brown sugar with the back of a spoon.
• Crush the cornflakes until they’re a similar size to rolled oats. I like to do this in a snaplock bag and crush with a rolling pin (when you’re done, save the bag for next time!). You could also crush them in a food processor if you prefer.
• Add the cornflakes to the other dry ingredients and mix.
• Put the butter, golden syrup and water into a small saucepan and heat over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until the butter is melted and the mixture is just starting to bubble slightly at the edges. Remove from the heat, whisk in the baking soda until dissolved – the mixture will bubble and foam up.
• Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and stir until well combined. The dough will be quite crumbly, but you should be able to roll a ball of it in your hand. If it’s too crumbly to do that, add a little extra melted butter or water, 1 teaspoon at a time.
• Roll a tablespoon of the dough at a time into balls, and place at least 2" apart on the baking trays. If you want smaller cookies, use a heaped teaspoonful of dough instead. Flatten the balls slightly with your hand.
• Bake for 10-14 minutes. 10 minutes should give you soft biscuits, 12 minutes should give you crunchy-edged biscuits with chewy centres, and 13-14 minutes should give you crunchy biscuits. Exact times will vary by oven and smaller biscuits will take less time to bake.
• Remove from the oven and leave to cool slightly on the trays before transferring to a wire rack to cool. If you like extra crunchy biscuits, you can let them cool completely on the baking trays.
• Store the biscuits in an airtight container for 1-2 weeks.

Notes

Gluten free flour: I use my favourite gluten-free baking flour blend to make these biscuits. You can use a ready-made gluten-free flour blend if you prefer. Different flour blends contain different ingredients, so you may need to adjust the recipe, depending on the blend. If your baked biscuits don’t spread enough, try adding a little bit more melted butter to the next batch. If they spread too much, add a little more flour next time, or a bit of xanthan gum.

I don’t add any binding gums like xanthan gum to these biscuits because I don’t find that they need it, but if your cookies turn out crumbly or spread too much, you could add 1/2 teaspoon of xanthan gum to the dry ingredients. Most ready-made gluten-free flour blends will contain a gum ingredient already.

Cornflakes: Make sure you buy gluten free cornflakes – most regular cornflakes are not gluten free (they contain barley malt extract, which contains gluten). For the Weet-Bix version of this recipe, click here.

I like to use a cookie scoop to portion out my cookie dough, but a good old spoon like the Anzac wives and families would have used will do the job just fine too.

Show Nutrition Hide Nutrition

Serving: 1g | Calories: 161kcal | Carbohydrates: 24g | Protein: 2g | Fat: 7g | Saturated Fat: 5g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 0.3g | Monounsaturated Fat: 1g | Trans Fat: 0.2g | Cholesterol: 12mg | Sodium: 73mg | Potassium: 39mg | Fiber: 2g | Sugar: 12g | Vitamin A: 155IU | Vitamin C: 0.1mg | Calcium: 16mg | Iron: 1mg

Nutritional Disclaimer: Any nutritional information provided is a computer generated estimate and is intended as a guide only.

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Enjoy!

-Natalie