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CREAM BISCUITS (flavoured with Lemon)
Beat up the yolks of six eggs with half a pound of finely-sifted sugar. When well worked together, add six whites whipped to a froth, one gill of whipped cream, and the grated peel of a lemon. Lay on a baking-sheet, a table-spoonful at a time, in the form of round biscuits. Bake in a moderate oven for ten to twelve minutes. These biscuits may be varied by substituting orange or vanilla for lemon flavouring. Probable cost, about 1s. 6d.
A Victorian sponge-and-cream drop biscuit, closer to a soft macaroon or a langue de chat than to anything called a biscuit in either modern sense. The list of ingredients has one conspicuous gap, so read the first point before starting.
- No flour is givenAs printed, this is nothing but eggs, sugar, cream and zest, which is likely to spread rather than hold the shape of the "round biscuits" described. Sponge-biscuit recipes of the period of this size commonly carry several ounces of flour to this quantity of egg and sugar; whether Cassell's omitted a line or genuinely intended a flourless wafer cannot be settled from the text. Decide which you want before you beat the yolks.
- A gillIn a British book of this date a gill is a quarter of an imperial pint, 5 fl oz, or about 150 ml. Measure the cream before whipping, not after.
- Half a pound of sugar225 g. "Finely-sifted" points to a fine sugar (caster or superfine), sifted to break up lumps; coarser granulated is slower to dissolve in the yolks and can leave a gritty texture.
- A moderate ovenThe recipe gives no temperature; "moderate" is conventionally read today as somewhere around 350F / 175-180C. At that heat ten to twelve minutes should give pale biscuits set at the edge and barely coloured on top; they firm as they cool.
- Folding orderYolks and sugar first to a thick ribbon. The recipe as printed adds the whipped whites next, then the cream, then the peel; fold in two or three additions either way. Once the whites are in, the batter starts deflating, so get the trays into the oven promptly rather than spooning out in leisurely batches.
- The zestGrate only the coloured outer layer of an unwaxed lemon; the white pith turns the biscuits bitter. Rubbing the zest into the sugar first before adding the yolks releases more of the oil.
- The baking sheetA sugar-and-egg batter with no fat in it welds itself to bare metal. Use baking parchment, and leave a good 2 in between spoonfuls, as these spread more than they rise.
- YieldA tablespoon at a time from six eggs gives roughly 30 to 36 biscuits. They go soft within a day; keep them airtight, and expect them to be best on the day they are made.
"Biscuit" in Cassell's covers a wide range of small baked goods, and this one belongs to the family of egg-foam confections that European bakers built on the sponge principle: whole eggs separated, the yolks worked with sugar until pale, the whites whipped and folded back in. The technique is the same one behind the Italian biscotti di Savoia and the French biscuit à la cuiller — literally "spoon biscuit," named for exactly the method given here, dropping the batter by the spoonful rather than rolling and cutting it. The addition of whipped cream is what earns the name in this version, and the lemon peel is one of three flavourings — lemon, orange and vanilla — which the recipe itself offers interchangeably. The costing in shillings and pence is often said to have been one of Cassell's selling points: it let a household mistress judge a dish against her weekly budget before ever ordering the ingredients.