Recipe: Sugar Biscuits

• Three pounds of flour, sifted.
• One pound of butter.
• A pound and a half of powdered sugar.
• Half a pint of milk.
• Two table-spoonfuls of brandy.
• A small tea-spoonful of pearl-ash dissolved in water.
• Four table-spoonfuls of carraway seeds.

Cut the butter into the flour. Add the sugar and carraway seeds. Pour in the brandy, and then the milk. Lastly, put in the pearl-ash. Stir all well with a knife, and mix it thoroughly, till it becomes a lump of dough.

Flour your paste-board, and lay the dough on it. Knead it very well. Divide it into eight or ten pieces, and knead each piece separately. Then put them all together, and knead them very well in one lump.
Cut the dough in half, and roll it out into sheets, about half an inch thick. Beat the sheets of dough very hard, on both sides, with the rolling-pin. Cut them out into round CAKEs with the edge of a tumbler. Butter iron pans, and lay the CAKEs in them. Bake them a very pale brown. If done too much, they will lose their taste.

These CAKEs kept in a stone jar, closely covered from the air, will continue perfectly good for several months.

Seventy-Five Receipts for Pastry Cakes, and Sweetmeats, by Miss Leslie (Year 1832)


See other recipes at Genealogy by Barry 
Source: Barry J. Ewell