Cookies like in childhood: recipes with photos

2024 Author: Isabella Gilson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:14

Any Soviet and post-Soviet child remembers milk biscuits. They were given for an afternoon snack in the kindergarten, they were sold in the school cafeteria and in the department store on the way home. They were often brought by my mother from work, they smelled sweetly of butter, sugar and quite a bit - paper for the first printers. We loved them ourselves, and our kids will certainly love them: it remains only to remember the very recipe for milk shortcakes from childhood according to GOST.

Dessert from the Soviet Union

Soviet children were not spoiled for gourmet desserts: dried fruit compote, dry jelly, grandma's pies on holidays and a couple of caramels - that, perhaps, is the whole modest set of an Octobrist or a pioneer.

Delicious shortcakes from childhood appeared in Soviet canteens in the 60s. Round, with carved edges "gingerbread" with a clear taste of soda were sold throughout the Union for 8 kopecks. Shortbreads were different: simple, with the remnants of flour on top; "glossy", covered with a thinlayer of egg "sugar", sprinkled on top with caramelized sugar, and nutty. The latter are better known in the regions, but in the capital one could often find sand rings with peanuts.

From catering to houses and apartments

It would seem that GOST is practically a state secret, but in the Soviet Union even harsh technologists had children who were waiting for them in round-the-clock nurseries and kindergartens, and therefore the recipe quickly spread among Soviet housewives.

And by the 80s shortbreads, as in childhood, were baked in almost every apartment. Cheap margarine, if possible, was replaced with butter, second-rate flour with a premium product. The quality only benefited from this, but the soda flavor remained: either Soviet housewives had a poor idea of the correct proportions for extinguishing soda, or they did not pursue the goal of getting rid of the smell, but the children continued to dearly love this plain dessert.

Come from the canteen, brought up in the family

Today, on the Internet and in all kinds of books devoted to Soviet cuisine, you can find hundreds of different recipes for shortcakes from childhood according to GOST, while they will differ not only in the ratio of ingredients, but also in general composition. Why did it happen if there was only one GOST for the whole country?

The answer is simple and on the surface. Each family changed the ingredients in the main recipe and changed the proportions at their discretion and in search of the perfect taste.

So day by day the recipe evolved and changed. However, is it possible today to find the same composition,who captured the Soviet people?

Korzhik recipe from childhood with photo

No matter how many variations of shortcakes you try, they all have one thing in common: they are all made from flour, sugar, milk, butter, eggs and vanillin.

To prepare 10 pieces, take:

• 420g wheat flour;
• 100 ml milk;
• 1 sachet of vanilla sugar;
• 1 egg;
• 200 g sugar;
• 100g butter;
• 1/2 tsp baking powder.

Bring milk with sugar and vanilla to a boil. Sift flour and baking powder into a separate bowl. Beat the room temperature butter thoroughly with a mixer, add the egg and continue to mix with a mixer until smooth. Pour the milk syrup into the egg mixture. Whisk in the flour and baking powder and quickly knead into a firm, smooth dough.

Roll out a layer 6 mm thick and use molds or a glass to cut out shortcakes with a diameter of 7-10 cm. Lubricate the finished products with whipped yolk and bake in an oven preheated to 210 degrees for 12 minutes. Let the shortbreads cool on a wire rack.

The same shape

Remember what shape those shortcakes had, as in childhood? Neat, even rounded edges, somewhat reminiscent of a flower. Who came up with this simple but memorable shape and how?

It is believed that the first shortcakes, which spread a little later throughout the Union, were first proposed by the technologist Postnov A. V., who workedat one time in the famous canteen of the Gorky Meat Processing Plant No. 1. It was he who considered it necessary to dilute the assortment of pies with jam and stale muffins with shortcrust pastry products that remain relatively fresh for a long time.

The chef didn't have any molds on hand, so to give his shortbreads a special look, he used… ordinary tin molds for baskets with protein cream.

How the shortbread life subsequently developed, history is silent, but the GOST recipe appeared already in 1960 in the book "Dough Products" by R. P. Kengis. Around that time, shortbreads entered the menu of all canteens in the USSR.

Simple 8 kopecks each and sugar 10 kopecks each

Simple shortcakes were round and smelled strongly of milk, sometimes they were smeared with yolk, and then they were pleasantly glossy. Sometimes there was no yolk, and the products were rough and powdered with flour.

Simultaneously with the usual, sugar "raw gingerbread" appeared - they were covered with a beaten egg and sprinkled with sugar, which was caramelized in the oven. Such shortbreads had a slightly elongated oval shape and fit well in the pocket of a school apron. Many girls of that time were scolded by their mothers and grandmothers for crumbs and grease stains from baking, but it was almost impossible to resist.

Soviet-era raw gingerbread

There were two whole recipes in Kengis's book: ordinary milk and sugar, sweet shortbreads. Secondunofficially called raw gingerbread. Cooking both of them is not at all difficult.

For sugar shortcakes, as in childhood, take:

• 670 g flour;
• 200 g sugar;
• 50g margarine;
• 5 g vanillin;
• 3g soda;
• 160ml water;
• 7g baking powder.

Mix the ingredients and knead into a soft, pliable dough. Sprinkle it with flour and roll it out to a thickness of 6-7 mm. Brush with vegetable oil and sprinkle generously with sugar. Walk on top of a regular or embossed rolling pin. Using a figured cutting, cut out future gingerbread cookies and lay them on baking paper. Bake at 200 degrees at an average level of 12-15 minutes. Ready-made gingerbread should be cooled on a wire rack.

Baking for all times

Time flies, eras and power change, but tastes remain. Milk cakes from childhood according to GOST are also included in modern official collections of recipes for schools and kindergartens.

Cooking these recipes is the surest way to get that nostalgic taste.

Ammonium or baking powder?

In most production recipes, you can find ammonium - one of the subspecies of baking powder used in confectionery. It can also be found in stores - usually in glass or plastic containers with tight-fitting lids.

However, is it advisable to use ammonium inhome baking? This baking powder is added to products with a moisture content of less than 5% - crackers, dry cookies or thin cake layers. In other baked goods, such as biscuits or pancakes, it can form life-threatening ammonia and render foods unfit for human consumption.

The baking powder itself should be stored in tightly closed sealed containers and added to the dough immediately before baking, as it forms ammonium bicarbonate, an extremely toxic substance, in contact with air.

The use of such a baking powder is justified only in industrial production, where the amount of ingredients is verified to the gram and the error is practically excluded. In home baking, it is better to use ordinary soda and acid in the correct proportions.

For big and small

Remember how, as a child, they put shortcakes on a glass of hot tea, and when it was time for dessert, it was already wet from the steam and became a little wet, but still very tasty?

As then, as now, shortcakes will appeal to both children and adults. Home-cooked pastries can be safely given even to kids: they will appreciate the delicate taste and softness. If you want to make GOST shortcakes even more useful, then try cooking them with cottage cheese.

Take:

• 400 g cottage cheese;
• 170g sugar;
• 2 eggs;
• 120g softened butter;
• 90ml serum;
• 400 g flour;
• 1 tsp soda.

Whip curd withbutter, sugar, eggs and whey until smooth, add flour with baking powder in parts, mixing thoroughly after the next portion, and knead a soft dough. Send it for half an hour in the refrigerator to "rest". Roll out the layer with a thickness of 6-7 mm, cut out future shortcakes, prick them with a fork and bake for 25 minutes at a temperature of 180 degrees.

In the finished product, the taste of cottage cheese is practically not felt, and therefore even the most fastidious kids will be happy to eat them for an afternoon snack. Cookies are convenient to take on the road or for a walk as a simple, satisfying and he althy snack. And adults can be a little nostalgic for those times when the grass was greener and the sky was higher. Bon appetit!