Greata Biscuits
Today I have another recipe that hasn’t been cooked in a long while (my speciality). This is an Australian biscuit recipe, from my grandmother’s green notebook.
Australian-style biscuits are nothing like US-style biscuits. I know everyone knows that, but I like making things clear. These biscuits aren’t that much like most Australian biscuits.
The word ‘biscuit’ - I have been told again and again - comes from the French ‘bis’ - ‘again’ and ‘cuit’ - ‘cooked’. My French is fine, but I am a bit wary of etymologies that make too much sense and for which I haven’t seen proof. If the etymology is correct, then originally biscuits were double-cooked and maybe a bit like rusks or hard ship biscuits. They would keep well.
I will keep an eye open for recipes using that technique that go back a long way - unless someone else has done a clear proof and I’ve missed reading it. I’ve seen lots of claims but not much in the way of evidence traced clearly and textually back over time. Mind you, until now I haven’t really been looking so it might be something that’s common knoweldge for more modern historians and might just go to show that my heart - and my doctorate - is the in Middle Ages.
This recipe is from the 1950s but reflects the family’s English antecedents. And yes, it does have the double baking. Now all I need is to find recipes that take the name back further and further and further. Watch this space. Or send in recipes. Both would be most welcome.
3 oz sugar
3 oz flour
3 oz almonds (whole)
4 egg whites
Beat whites with sugar. Mix in other ingredients and bake in a medium oven. Leave overnight. Cut in tissue slices and rebake.
PS Does anyone know what a ’tissue slice’ is? I assume it’s a tissue-thin slice and that these biscuits are what are sometimes called ‘almond bread.’
November 4th, 2006 at 4:45 pm
You say bake in a medium oven. Leave overnight.
That means you leave the “baked” biscuits in the oven overnight?
Interesting…I’ll have to try these.
November 4th, 2006 at 4:50 pm
What happens if you only have a large oven?
I’m curious to see what happened when you tried making them… (hint!)
November 4th, 2006 at 6:06 pm
This is a grandmotherly recipe, Suzanne, which means that it doesn’t conform to professional standards of writing out everything that needs to be done. I would take the biscuits out of the oven overnight, myself, just because I can’t see any reason to leave them more than the time they need to cook initially. I could be wrong though, since the trouble with grandmotherly recipes is that there are always at least two ways of doing things.
Susan, a camping oen would be even worse :).