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Shortcake Biscuit
Make Standard Biscuit, using shortening to taste, and biscuits rather larger than ordinary. Split and butter biscuits while hot. Take any fresh fruit, crush it, and add enough sugar to make plenty of juice. Pour crushed fruit over and between biscuits, just before serving. Strawberries, raspberries, blue berries, peaches or any ripe or canned fruit can be used. In using canned fruits, drain from the syrup and cut into pieces. Dilute cream with some of the syrup instead of milk. Whipped cream, sweetened or flavored, can be added. This form of shortcake has become very popular, on account of its convenience.
A shortcake built on baking-powder biscuits rather than a sweet cake batter. The recipe assumes you have the book's Standard Biscuit in front of you, so the working details are worth spelling out.
- The base"Standard Biscuit" refers to the book's own plain baking-powder biscuit, which is not reproduced here. A typical biscuit of the period runs to about 2 cups flour, 4 teaspoons baking powder, ½ teaspoon salt, 2 to 4 tablespoons fat and about ¾ cup milk. "Shortening to taste" leaves the fat open; the higher end of that range will give a richer, more tender shortcake.
- OvenThe recipe gives no oven direction; biscuits of this kind are usually baked in a hot oven, around 450F, for 12 to 15 minutes. "Rather larger than ordinary" suggests cutting them about 3 inches across, which from the quantities above would give roughly six to eight; add a couple of minutes to the bake.
- Split while hotThis is the hinge. A biscuit split with a fork while it is still steaming separates along its own layers and drinks the juice; one left to cool tears and stays dry, and the butter sits on top instead of soaking in.
- The fruitCrush and sugar the fruit at least 30 minutes ahead so it draws its own juice. Around 1 quart of berries to ⅓ to ½ cup sugar is a workable proportion, though the recipe leaves it to taste. Peaches should be peeled and sliced before crushing.
- Canned fruitThe instruction to dilute cream with the reserved syrup rather than milk still works with today's canned peaches or pears, though modern packing liquid varies from heavy syrup to plain juice, so its sweetness is less predictable. Taste before adding more sugar.
- Assemble at the tableSauce the biscuits "just before serving" and mean it. Left standing, the split faces soften and go soggy.
- CreamWhipping cream runs about 30 to 36 percent fat and heavy cream 36 percent or more; either will whip, and ultra-pasteurized cream whips but tends to hold less air. A tablespoon of sugar per cup, and vanilla if you want the "flavored" version.
- YieldServes six to eight, one large split biscuit each.
Strawberry shortcake appears in American cookbooks from the middle of the nineteenth century, and the argument over whether the base should be a biscuit dough or a sponge cake was already familiar by the time this book appeared. The closing note here -- that this form has become popular "on account of its convenience" -- points to chemical leavening, widely available commercially by the late nineteenth century, which let a cook put a shortcake on the table quickly, with no yeast to set and no eggs to beat. The list of acceptable fruits, ending with "any ripe or canned fruit," also reflects a period in which commercially and home-canned fruit was extending the dessert beyond the short strawberry season.