Biscuit
American biscuit (left) and one variety of British biscuit (right) – the American biscuit is soft and flaky like a scone; whereas British biscuits are drier and often crunchy.
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Biscuit is a term used for a diverse variety of baked, commonly flour-based food products. The term is applied to two distinct products in North America and the Commonwealth of Nations and Europe. The North American biscuit is typically a soft, leavened quick bread, and is covered in the article Biscuit (bread). This article covers the other type of biscuit, which is typically hard, flat and unleavened.
The modern-day difference in the English language regarding the word "biscuit" is provided by British cookery writer Elizabeth David in English Bread and Yeast Cookery, in the chapter "Yeast Buns and Small Tea Cakes" and section "Soft Biscuits". She writes,
It is interesting that these soft biscuits (such as scones) are common to Scotland and Guernsey, and that the term biscuit as applied to a soft product was retained in these places, and in America, whereas in England it has completely died out.
The Old French word bescuit is derived from the Latin words bis (twice) and coquere, coctus (to cook, cooked), and, hence, means "twice-cooked". This is because biscuits were originally cooked in a twofold process: first baked, and then dried out in a slow oven. This term was then adapted into English in the 14th century during the Middle Ages, in the Middle English word bisquite, to represent a hard, twice-baked product. The Dutch language from around 1703 had adopted the word koekje ("little cake") to have a similar meaning for a similar hard, baked product. The difference between the secondary Dutch word and that of Latin origin is that, whereas the koekje is a cake that rises during baking, the biscuit, which has no raising agent, in general does not (see gingerbread/ginger biscuit), except for the expansion of heated air during baking.
- In Commonwealth English and Hiberno-English, a biscuit is a small baked product that would be called either a "cookie" or a "cracker" in the United States and most of English-speaking Canada. Biscuits in the United Kingdom, the Isle of Man and Ireland are hard and may be savoury or sweet, such as chocolate biscuits, digestives, hobnobs, ginger nuts, rich tea, bourbons, and custard creams. In the Commonwealth Nations and Ireland, the term "cookie" typically refers to only one type of biscuit (chocolate chip cookie); however, it may also locally refer to specific types of biscuits or breads.
- In the United States and some parts of English Canada, a "biscuit" is a quick bread, somewhat similar to a scone, and usually unsweetened. Leavening is achieved through the use of baking powder or when using buttermilk baking soda. Biscuits are usually referred to as either "baking powder biscuits" or "buttermilk biscuits" if buttermilk is used rather than milk as a liquid. A Southern regional variation using the term "beaten biscuit" (or in New England "sea biscuit") is closer to hardtack than soft dough biscuits.
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