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Tea Biscuits
Follow the proportions for drop biscuits, using only three-fourths cup milk. Turn the dough onto a board dredged with flour, pat to one-half inch thickness, cut in small rounds, handling as little as possible, place in a pan rubbed with Mazola and bake twenty minutes in a quick oven, 375 to 400 degrees F. To glaze the tops, brush with one teaspoon Karo mixed with one-fourth cup milk.
A rolled biscuit built on the book's drop biscuit formula, with the liquid cut back so the dough can be patted and cut. Two of the named ingredients are brand names from the sponsor of the book.
- The base proportions are on another pageThis recipe is a variation and gives no flour, leavening or fat. A standard biscuit of the period runs about 2 cups flour, 4 teaspoons baking powder, ½ teaspoon salt and 3 to 4 tablespoons fat; with the ¾ cup milk specified here you get a soft but cuttable dough.
- Mazola is corn oilThen as now, a refined corn oil. "A pan rubbed with Mazola" means a lightly oiled sheet or shallow pan; any neutral oil does the same job. If the drop biscuit base also calls for Mazola as the shortening, expect a slightly softer, less flaky crumb than a lard or butter biscuit.
- Karo is corn syrupThe glaze is one teaspoon corn syrup stirred into 1/4 cup milk. The text gives the glaze instruction after the baking direction and does not say at what stage to brush it on. It gives a thin gloss and a little browning, not sweetness. An egg wash browns harder; milk alone browns less.
- The oven number is already given, and it is low for biscuitsThe text says 375 to 400F, which is at the cool end of what a period cook meant by "quick." Modern biscuit practice runs 425 to 450F so the leavening lifts before the crust sets. At 400F, ½-inch rounds will be done well before twenty minutes; start checking at twelve.
- CuttingPress the cutter straight down and lift; twisting seals the edge and the biscuit rises unevenly. Re-rolled scraps toughen, so gather them with as little kneading as possible and accept that the second batch is inferior.
- Thickness and yieldHalf an inch of dough gives a modest biscuit that roughly doubles in height. Two cups of flour cut in small rounds of about 1½ inches yields 14 to 18; expect a dozen at 2 inches.
- Dredged board"Dredged" here simply means dusted with flour. Use it sparingly on the surface and on your hands, since flour worked into a wet dough at this stage stiffens the crumb.
Mazola and Karo were both products of the Corn Products Refining Company, and their appearance by name throughout a book of this kind marks it as a manufacturer's promotional cookbook rather than an independent household manual. Such books were given away or sold cheaply from the early 1900s onward and worked by taking familiar recipes and substituting the sponsor's goods for butter, lard and sugar, which is why a plain baking-powder biscuit here is oiled with corn oil and glazed with corn syrup. The recipe itself is ordinary American quick bread: "tea biscuits" are the small rolled rounds served at tea, distinguished from drop biscuits only by the reduced milk that makes the dough firm enough to pat and cut.