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Dessert

Quick Made Rusks

A quick biscuit made with flour, sugar, baking powder, lard, milk, eggs, nutmeg, cinnamon, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Goff, May Perrin, [from old catalog] ed · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,623 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Quick Made Rusks

Ingredients

Directions

Mix the dough

  1. Measure one and a half pints flour, half a teaspoonful salt, two tablespoonfuls sugar, two teaspoonfuls baking powder, two tablespoonfuls lard, three eggs, one teaspoonful each extract nutmeg and cinnamon, and one pint milk.

  2. Sift together the flour, salt, sugar and powder.

  3. Rub in the lard while it is cold.

  4. Add the milk, beaten eggs and extracts.

  5. Mix into a dough soft enough to handle.

Shape and bake

  1. Turn out the dough on the board.

  2. Give the dough a quick turn or two to improve its smoothness.

  3. Break off the dough into small pieces.

  4. Roll each piece under the hand into small balls round and about as large as a small egg.

  5. Lay the balls in a greased shallow baking pan very close together.

  6. Wash over the balls with a little melted butter and milk.

  7. Bake in a moderate oven for about thirty minutes.

Finish

  1. When the biscuits are cold, sift fine sugar over them.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

858Calories
27 gProtein
28 gFat
121 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 7 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Lard1 tbsp (12.8g)115
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Nutmeg1 tsp ground (2.2g)12
Salt1 tsp (6g)0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Goff, May Perrin, [from old catalog] ed. 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. See the original page.

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 + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Nutmeg + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,685 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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
Forms the structure of the dough that holds the rusks together.
Lard
Rubbed into the flour, it tenderises the crumb by coating the flour particles.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, binding the dough and helping it set when baked.
Baking powder
Releases gas when heated, helping the rusks rise and lighten.
Milk
Hydrates the flour and adds moisture, softness and browning.

The step that matters

Rub in the lard while it is cold. Cold fat stays in solid pieces that coat flour particles, keeping the crumb tender. Warm or melted fat blends in unevenly and can make the rusks tough or greasy.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Jalapenofits less well
  4. Turmericfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, milk, 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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