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Dessert

Yarmouth Biscuits

A currant biscuit made with currants, powdered sugar, flour, butter, and eggs, baked until lightly browned.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Yarmouth Biscuits

Oven, in the book's wordsA sharp oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a sharp oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Wash and pick the currants clean, then dry them well.

  2. Rub a little flour among the currants to make them white.

Make the dough

  1. On a clean surface, combine the currants and powdered sugar.

  2. Add the sifted flour and fresh butter, then mix all ingredients together to form a paste.

  3. Roll the paste to an eighth of an inch thick and cut into desired shapes.

Bake

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Place two or three sheets of paper under the biscuits on the baking tray.

  3. Bake until just browned, being careful not to overbake.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Currant + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,856 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  5. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the biscuits together as they bake.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness, and helps the paste hold together.
Eggs
Bind the paste and add structure and richness to the biscuits.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the biscuits and blends smoothly into the paste.
Currants
Add fruity sweetness and chewy bits throughout the biscuits.

The step that matters

Bake until just browned. Overbaking dries out the biscuits and makes them hard, because moisture leaves the dough as it heats. Pulling them out when just browned keeps them tender.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, flour, butter, egg):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, flour, butter, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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