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Dessert

Yorkshire Biscuits

Yorkshire biscuits are a yeasted, buttered biscuit made with flour, eggs, milk, and yeast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Yorkshire Biscuits

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. Take out 1 cup of flour and set it aside.

  2. In a large bowl, combine the remaining flour and cut‑up butter.

  3. Add the beaten eggs, yeast, and enough milk to form a dough.

  4. Knead the dough well.

Roll and shape

  1. Roll the dough out.

  2. Sprinkle the reserved flour over the dough.

  3. Roll the dough out again, repeating until all flour is used.

  4. Roll the dough thin.

  5. Cut out biscuits.

Bake

  1. Butter your baking tins.

  2. Place the biscuits on them.

  3. Let the biscuits rise again.

  4. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until golden.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  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

All-purpose flour
Forms the structure of the dough once mixed with liquid and kneaded.
Yeast
Produces gas that makes the dough rise and gives the biscuits a light texture.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderises the dough and contributes richness and browning.
Eggs
Add richness and structure, helping bind the dough and aid browning.
Milk
Hydrates the flour so the dough forms and can be kneaded and rolled.

The step that matters

Roll the dough thin. Rolling the dough thin before cutting lets the biscuits bake through evenly. Thick dough can stay doughy in the centre while the edges over-brown.

“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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