Home-made Biscuits

New Zealand Listener, Volume 5, Issue 110, 1 August 1941, Page 52

Home-made Biscuits

HAT useful things biscuits are, especially dainty homemade ones! To the housewife with a well-filled tin of biscuits in her pantry, the unexpected caller is never an embarrassment, for with a plate of novel biscuits, some thin bread and butter and a few sandwiches, either -afternoon tea or supper can be set out in just a few minutes. Biscuits, moreover, do not get stale, like cake, but stay crisp in their tin till eaten up; and even if they get a little soft through the children leaving the lid of the tin ajar. they soon crisp up and are as good as ever if put in the warm oven for a little while. Biscuits are cheap to make, too, for they are cooked so much more quickly than cake, need very few eggs, and seldom, if ever, any fruit. They offer an excellent opportunity to make the children eat bran, wholemeal, vimax and oatmeal; besides being hard to crunch on, thus exercising their teeth. With all this in mind, the Daisy Chain has just finished a competition for otiginal biscuit recipes, and here are some of the wholesome ideas sent in. Cut the page out, and keep it. Short Biscuits With VariationsSavoury And Sweet Foundation Recipe--Four tablespoons of fire vimax, 2 tablespoons of white flour, 2 tablespoons fine wholemeal, 1 tablespoon cornflour, 60z. butter, 1 large egg yolk (beaten), 2 small teaspoons baking powder, a little milk may be required, and 3 tablespoons castor sugar for the sweet biscuits. Rub the butter into the sifted dry ingtedients, Mix with egg to form a dough easy to handle. Knead lightly. Roll out Yin, thick for savouries — thinner for sandwich biscuits or bars, Variations Curry Bisctuits. — Add % teaspoon curry powder. Use with meat, egg, or fish dishes. Tomato Biscuits- Use tomato juice, or tomato sauce, or tomato puree in mixing — of soOup powder instead of cornflour. Use with cheese dishes and salads, Cheese Biscuits-Add 4% cup grated cheese. Use celery salt (with vegetables). Ham Biscuits-Add 4% cup minced ham. Use with scrambled eggs; peas. Herb Biscuits-Add 1 teaspoon of 6ither powdered mint, sage, thyme, or fresh parsley (more). With meat stews. For Sweet Biscuits. — Any flavouring or cocoa; ground almonds in place of cornflour. Cut in two sizes with fluted cutter and when cold, put one large and oné small together with icing to suit.

Witches’ Hats For Parties Round short biscuits rolled thinly and baked, ice cream cones, chocolate icing, ice cream or jelly. Just ice the tops of the biscuits; ice the cones on the outside, and fill with the ice cream or jelly. Tura upside down on the biscuits, Pinwheels Divide the dough into two pieces and colour differently. Roll thinly. Place one colour on top of the other, moistening edges with milk to hold them together. Roll up and slice. Sprinkle with cinnamon and brown sugar. Apticot Peanut Bars (foundation recipe to be used).-Roll short biscuit dough in longish strip, 34% inches wide. Spread one half with the following filling -wet the edges with milk, fold over, and cut in bars. Filling.-Mix 4% cup brown sugar with 1 tablespoon flour. Add gradually (while stirring) % cup water. Add ™% cup chopped dried apricots. Stir over fire until thick and no raw taste is there, Remove. Cool a little, Add 4% cup pea nut butter, Mix well. Chocolate Dominoes From Foundation Recipe Divide the mixture, colour one choco+ late. Roll a little thinner, cut in strips, and then in lengths so that they are the size of a domino-2in. x lin. Place when cool and cooked, a brown one on @ white, with jam or icing between. Ice the top with contrasting colours and drop spots on with the aid of a skewer, or use tiny silver cachons. The dough may be rolled to fit the oven slide and cut into shapes after cooking. Short Biscuit Daisies Ice the tops of round biscuits. Arrange halved or split almond or peanut kernels to form petals with coloured jubes for centres. Sandwich Biscuits Stick two together with icing. Marshmallow Top with marshmallow and finish with icing, made-1 packet of jelly crystals, 1% cups water. Soak in ¥%2 cup water for 10 minutes, add the rest of the water. Boil 8 minutes. Cool. Beat till thick. Filled Short Biscuits Roll out thin sheet. Cover with a mixture of 1 cup of dates, 1 tablespoon brown sugar, 1 teaspoon lemon juice, 1 tablespoon butter, 2 tablepoons, of water. Boil. Beat till thick. Add chopped nuts and cover with another sheet of dough. Press evenly with rolling movement of rolling pin. Bake and cut into biscuits. So you see you have fourteen different kinds of biscuits from this one excellent foundation recipe. (Continued on next page)

(Continued frorn previous page) (These were sent in by " Mrs. Nicotinus" of Hamilton.) Now try this one. Honey Wafers One cup of fine vimax, 1 cup of flour, 6 tablespoons liquid honey, 4% Ib. butter, 4% cup sugar, 1 egg, 1 egg yolk, 2 teaspoons baking powder, grated rind of 1 lemon, salt, walnuts, meringue of 1 egg white. Cream the butter and honey, then add the sugar and cream again. Beat egg and egg yolk. Add, Add lemon rind, then

L A the dry ingredients. Drop by spoonfuls-apart-on greased slide. Cover with meringue (1 egg white, 2 tablespoons sugar, and salt) and nuts. Moderate oven. Leave on slide to cool. This makes a lot of wafers. Rice Wafers Two ounces of, butter, $ cup of brown sugar, 1 beaten egg, 42 cup flour (scant), 1 breakfast cup coarse. vimax, 1 breakfast cup puffed rice, 4% teaspoon soda, 44 teaspoon vanilla, 3 tablespoons extra butter. Melt the 3 tablespoons of butter in a pan. When sizzling add the rice. Stir and sizzle 10 minutes till crisp, then add the vimax and go on cooking and stirring a few minutes. Cream the 2o0z. butter with sugar, salt and vanilla. Add the egg, then sifted flour and soda. Lastly add crisped rice and vimax while hot. Space well in teaspoon lots on well greased shelf. Cook in good oven, but not too quickly. Leave on shelf to cool. Lift off carefully with a knife. Fruit Nut Marshmallows-sent by a young competitor of eighteen years. One breakfast cup of fine vimax, 4% cup cornflour, 2 level teaspoons baking powder, 44 cup brown sugar, % teaspoon salt, 4oz. butter, 1 egg, little milk to mix. Mix the vimax, cornflour, baking powder, sugar and salt. Add the melted butter, well beaten egg, and lastly sufficient milk to make a fairly stiff mixture. Roll out thinly on a cold greased

tray, and mark into squares. Bake in hot | oven 450 degrees for about 15 minutes. When cool, place a layer of minced sultanas and walnuts, blended with a little honey, between each two of the biscuits. On top spread some of the following marshmallow mixture — dissolve 2 teaspoons of gelatine in 4% cup hot water. Leave till cool. Add beaten white of an egg, lemon flavouring, and one cup of icing sugar. Beat till thick and creamy. Finish each with half of a walnut. | Finally, here is an original ‘recipe from a man. Not only did he send an excellent recipe, but also several handy hints. Here is part of his letter:"Enclosed is my biscuit recipe. It is my effort. The result of this competition should be in my favour, considering what I went through to make these biscuits. I am a grocer, and live on the premises. Well, one afternoon my wife went out, so I set to work, hoping to get the mess cleaned up before she got home. However, she beat me to it, and was I popular? ‘I lett the kitchen nice and clean when I went out,’ she said, ‘and now look at it.’ "T eventually cleaned up, but in the meantime I gave her one of my inventions to try. ‘Not bad, where did you get the recipe? What's in them? I’ll have another. My, these are good! Another please!" "Needless to say they did not last long. Next day, we made some more and they ‘ turned out nice again.’ " Now a couple of hints. Press a crown top off a lemonade or beer bottle into one side of the cake of toilet soap. This raises the soap off the wet container or place where it is kept, and so saves soap. "When packing parcels of tinned g00ds or anything for overseas, tightly ram in biscuit flakes in all spaces between tins. This packing is very light, and as much as half a packet can be used, adding very little to the weight of the parcel. This' can then be eaten in the ordinary way as an addition to the menu. By the way, write on the tin or cardboard outer of the parcel, that packing is eatable! Insert a note also stating what the packing is, and what it can be used for. " GROCER-COOK." And this is the recipe: Lemon or Orange Crisps One and a-half cups of fine vimax, 114 cups of flour, 1 teaspoon of baking powder, 4oz of sugar, 4oz. of butter, 2 eggs, the grated rind of 1 lemon, or orange. Sift flour and baking powder together about three times. Beat the eggs thoroughly, and pour into the vimax and mix, in a separate bowl. This allows the vimax to soak and swell. Now cream the butter and sugar in a separate bowl. Stir in the lemon or orange rind, and a few drops of juice. Now add the egg and vimax mixture, and mix thoroughly. Add the flour and mix. Turn out on to floured board and roll out as thinly as possible. If careful the dough will not break. Cut into convenient shapes and place on greased trays. Bake in moderate oven till crisp and lightly browned — about half an hour. Allow to remain on trays till cold. Store in an airtight tin. Makes quite a fair quantity of biscuits. Very many thanks. How proud of you your wife must be! (Continued on page 54)