Beaten Biscuit: (Old Style.) Sift a quart of flour into a bowl or tray, add half a teaspoon salt, then cut small into it a teacup of very cold lard. Wet with cold water—ice water is best—into a very stiff dough. Lay on a floured block, or marble slab, and give one hundred strokes with a mallet or rolling pin. Fold afresh as the dough beats thin, dredging in flour if it begins to stick. The end of beating is to distribute air well through the mass, which, expanding by the heat of baking, makes the biscuit light. The dough should be firm, but smooth and very elastic. Roll to half-inch thickness, cut out with a small round cutter, prick lightly all over the top, and bake in steady heat to a delicate brown. Too hot an oven will scorch and blister, too cold an one make the biscuit hard and clammy. Aim for the Irishman's "middle exthrame."
There are sundry machines which do away with beating. It is possible also to avoid it by running the dough, after mixing, several times through a food-chopper. Also beaten biscuit can be closely imitated by making good puff paste, rolling, cutting out, pricking and baking—but rather more quickly than the real thing. All these are expedients for those who live in apartments, where the noise of beating might be held against good neighborhood. Householders, and especially suburban ones, should indulge in the luxury of a block or stone or marble slab—and live happy ever after, if they can but get cooks able and willing to make proper use of it.
Soda Biscuit: (Old Style.) Sift a quart of flour with a heaping teaspoonful of baking soda. Add a good pinch of salt, rub well through lard or butter the size of the fist, then wet with sour milk to a moderately soft dough, roll out, working quickly, cut with small round cutter, set in hot pans, leaving room to swell, and bake in a quick oven just below scorching heat. Handle as lightly as possible all through—this makes flaky biscuit.
By way of variety, roll out thin—less than a half-inch, cut with three-inch cutter, grease lightly on top, and fold along the middle. Let rise on top a hot stove several minutes before putting to bake. By adding an egg, beaten light, with a heaping tablespoonful of sugar to the dough in mixing, these doubled biscuit will be quite unlike the usual sort.
Salt Rising Bread: (As Mammy Made It.) Scald a tablespoonful of sifted cornmeal, and a teaspoonful—heaped—of salt with a pint of boiling water, let stand ten minutes, then stir in, taking care to mix smooth, enough dried and sifted flour to make a thick batter. Damp flour will not rise. The batter should be almost thick enough to hold the mixing spoon upright—but not quite thick enough. Set the mixture in warm water—just as hot as you can bear your hand in. Keep up the heat steadily, but never make too hot—scalding ruins everything. Keep lightly covered, and away from draughts. Look in after an hour—if water has risen on top, stir in more flour. Watch close—in six hours the yeast should be foamy-light. Have ready three quarts of dry sifted flour, make a hole in the center of it, pour in the yeast, add a trifle more salt, a tablespoonful sugar, and half a cup of lard. Work all together to a smooth dough, rinsing out the vessel that has held the yeast, with warm not hot water to finish the mixing. Divide into loaves, put in greased pans, grease lightly over the top, and set to rise, in gentle heat. When risen bake with steady quick heat. Take from pans hot, and cool between folds of clean cloth, spread upon a rack, or else turn the loaves edgewise upon a clean board, and cover with cheese cloth.
To make supper-rolls, shape some of the dough into balls, brush over with melted butter, set in a deep pan, just so they do not touch, raise and bake the same as bread. Dough can be saved over for breakfast rolls, by keeping it very cold, and working in at morning, a tiny pinch of soda before shaping the balls.
Sweet Potato Biscuit: (Old Style.) Boil soft two large or four small sweet potatoes, mash smooth while very hot, free of strings and eyes, add a pinch of salt, then rub well through three cups of sifted flour. Rub in also a generous handful of shortening, then wet up soft with two eggs beaten very light, and sweet milk. A little sugar also if you have a sweet tooth—but only a little. Roll to half-inch thickness, cut out with small cutter, lay in warm pan, and bake brown in a quick oven. Soda and buttermilk can take the place of eggs and sweet milk—in which case the sugar is advisable. Mix the soda with the milk—enough to make it foamy, but no more.
Waffles: (Mammy's.) Separate three eggs. Beat yolks and whites very light. Add to the yolks alternately a pint of very rich sweet milk, and handfuls of sifted flour. Enough to make a batter rather thicker than cream. Put in also half a teaspoon—scant—of salt, and half a cup of lard, or lard and butter, melted so it will barely run. Mix well, then add the beaten whites of egg. Have the waffle irons hot but not scorching—grease well with melted lard—the salt in butter will make the batter stick. Cook quickly but take care not to burn. Lay on hot plate—have a pitcher of melted butter to pour on. Lay the second waffle upon the first, butter, and keep hot. It is not safe to begin serving without at least six waffles in plate. This, of course, provided you have several eaters with genuine appetites. Syrup can be passed with the waffles—but it is profanation to drench them with it—strong clear coffee, and broiled chicken are the proper accompaniments at breakfast.
Plain Corn Bread: (The Best.) Sift sound fresh white cornmeal, wet with cold water to a fairly soft dough, shape it by tossing from hand to hand into small pones, and lay them as made into a hot pan well sprinkled with dry meal. The pan should be hot enough to brown the meal without burning it. Make the pones about an inch thick, four inches long, and two and a half broad. Bake quickly, taking care not to scorch, until there is a brown crust top and bottom. For hoe-cakes make the dough a trifle softer, lay it by handfuls upon a hot-meal-sprinkled griddle, taking care the handfuls do not touch. Flatten to half an inch, let brown underneath, then turn, press down and brown the upper side. Do not let yourself be seduced into adding salt—the delight of plain corn-bread is its affinity for fresh butter. It should be eaten drenched with butter of its own melting—the butter laid in the heart of it after splitting pone or hoe-cake. Salt destroys this fine affinity. It however savors somewhat bread to be eaten butterless. Therefore Mammy always said: "Salt in corn-bread hit does taste so po' white-folks'y." She had little patience with those neighbors of ours who perforce had no butter to their bread.
Egg Bread: (Mammy's.) Beat two eggs very light with a pinch of salt, add two cups sifted cornmeal, then wet with a pint of buttermilk in which a teaspoonful of soda has been dissolved. Stir in a spoonful of shortening, barely melted, mix well, and pour into well greased pans or skillets, cook quickly, till the crust is a good brown, and serve immediately. Or bake in muffin moulds. For delicate stomachs the shortening can be left out, but pans or moulds must be greased extra well. If milk is very sour, make it one-third water—this is better than putting in more soda.