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French Sweet Rusks. Richest
The receipt for making these is inquired for at places where they are made in perfection, perhaps oftener than any other. They are cakes rather than bread; very showy, and never fail to attract notice. Should only be attempted with the strongest yeast or lightest dough, as they are otherwise slow to rise. The art to be acquired through practice is to make them elastic and pleasant eating, not clammy like half-baked bread. 1 pound of light dough. 6 ounces of butter. 4 ounces of sugar. 6 yolks and 1 whole egg. Half cup of milk. Flavoring as indicated below. 1 1/4 pounds of flour.
If for afternoon tea, take the dough from the breakfast rolls, and six hours before the rusks are wanted place it in a pan with the butter, sugar and cream. Let all get warmed through and the butter softened, then mix them thoroughly. Next add the eggs and flour by littles, alternately, beating the mixture up against the side of the pan, to make it smooth and elastic. Spread the last handful of flour on the table, knead the dough as for rolls, pressing and spreading it out with the knuckles, and folding it over repeatedly. Set it in a warm place for 2 or 3 hours. Then knead it the second time. Every time the dough is doubled on itself the two edges should be pressed together first. When the dough of this and of the brioche receipt is good and finished it looks silky, and air will snap from the edge when it is pinched. After this secend kneading the dough should stand an hour and then be kneaded once more and made into shapes The smaller notched shape in the engraving of rolls is perhaps the best for these. Do not brush over the tops with butter lest they run out of shape. Rise in the pans 1 1/2 hours. Bake in a slow oven fifteen minutes Brush over when done with sugar, egg, and water, mixed and flavor with vanilla, and dredge granulated sugar over.
A little flavoring may be added in the dough; either vanilla extract, vanilla and rose mixed, orange or nutmeg; but for a nice variation grate in the rind of one or two lemons and squeeze in some of the juice. If to be made overnight without light dough for a start, all the ingredients can be mixed at once by taking a pint of yeast and half pint of milk--or nearly all yeast--adding all the other articles and flour to make soft dough.
An enriched brioche-type dough built on a piece of ordinary bread dough, shaped small and baked soft. The instructions assume you already have risen dough on hand and a wood-fired oven cooling from the morning's bread.
- The starting dough"1 pound of light dough" means a pound of plain, fully risen white bread dough — the recipe suggests pinching it off the breakfast rolls. A pound is roughly the amount a straight dough of 10 oz flour and 6 oz water yields, and any lean white dough at peak rise will serve.
- Milk or creamThe ingredient list says half a cup of milk, the method says cream. Either works; cream gives the richer crumb the title promises. Use half a cup of whichever, warmed with the butter and sugar.
- OvenA slow oven is usually reckoned at around 300-325F. Fifteen minutes at that heat suits small rolls only; larger shapes will need longer, and are done at about 190F internally.
- The hingeEverything depends on developing the dough properly. The book's own test is exact and still the best one: the dough looks silky and air snaps audibly from the edge when pinched. Under-kneaded enriched dough is what produces the clammy, half-baked texture the author warns against.
- Adding flour and egg alternatelyBeating the mixture against the side of the pan between additions is the hand version of what a stand mixer does with a dough hook on medium. Add the flour and egg in several small additions rather than all at once, as the recipe's 'by littles' directs.
- TimingThree rises plus shaping: 2-3 hours, then an hour, then 1 1/2 hours in the pans. Six hours from start to table is realistic in a warm kitchen and slow in a cold one, and matches the six hours the recipe allows. Refrigerating the dough overnight after the first rise is a modern convenience.
- "A pint of yeast"In the overnight version this means a pint of liquid barm or homemade yeast, not dried yeast, and it stands in for much of the liquid. There is no reliable conversion — its strength varied by household. Build the dough the first way, from risen bread dough, and the problem disappears.
- The finishing glazeSugar, egg and water brushed on after baking, then dredged with granulated sugar, sets on the residual heat into a thin sweet shell. Brush the rolls the moment they leave the oven. The warning against buttering the tops before baking is sound: fat on the surface slackens the shape.
"Rusk" normally means bread baked twice until dry and hard, a keeping food from the days of ships' stores, but by the nineteenth century American bakeries used the word loosely for a small, rich, sweet roll of exactly this type — the author is careful to say at the outset that "they are cakes rather than bread." The dough is a brioche in all but name, and the book cross-references its own brioche receipt for the silky, snapping-air test. The starting point is a pound of dough borrowed from the morning's rolls, a habit of any working bakery or any kitchen that baked bread daily, and the reason the author can promise tea rusks six hours after breakfast. The flavourings listed — vanilla, rose, orange, nutmeg, lemon — are the standard American confectioner's palette of the period.