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Dessert

Graham Biscuit

A sweet biscuit made with flour, baking soda, cream of tartar, milk, lard or butter, salt, and molasses.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓

Graham Biscuit

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, mix the flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt.

  2. In another bowl, combine the milk, lard or butter, and molasses.

  3. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix until just combined.

Bake

  1. Spoon the batter onto a greased baking sheet.

  2. Bake for 45 minutes or until golden brown.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + molassestop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,429 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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
Forms the main structure of the biscuit as its proteins and starches set when baked.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the dough so it reacts with baking soda to produce rising gas.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in the dough to release carbon dioxide, lifting the biscuit.
Milk
Adds moisture to hydrate the flour and helps the biscuit brown in the oven.
Lard or butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and contributes to a soft texture.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, moisture and color, contributing to the golden-brown crust.

The step that matters

Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix until just combined. Once liquid meets flour, gluten starts to form; overmixing toughens the biscuit. Stopping as soon as the flour is moistened keeps the texture tender, and the leavening reaction begins right away, so the batter should go into the oven promptly.

“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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