Martje's Butter Biscuits and Burls

Frewyn butter biscuits and burls: A National Treasure

Baronous on butter biscuits: Only a kingdom that thrives on how many pounds of butter it produces  would think to make biscuits from butter alone. It is an art really, a something like magic which graces each kitchen and greases each pan. I have no other explanation as to how every Frewyn household is able to turn their butter into dinner and dessert. In Marridon we have biscuits enough, but butter in Marridon is an ingredient, not a reason. We use it an accent rather than a feature, but as I have previously stated, butter is the gold standard in the kingdom, and where the Empire shines in other lights, the aurulent haze of well-loved ovens and well-lined skillets will always belong to our cousins to the south. That is not to say Marridon has no idea what to do with butter: on the contrary, Marridon’s tea culture is well documented, and though we are the standing champions of biscuits and buns, when there is anything like butter in the case, Frewyn will that point in the rivalry every time. It is in the grass, or in the air, or whatever Frewyn cows and goats consume promotes the flavour of their meat and milk—or perhaps it has something to do with their belief in the Gods, a blessing granted by Chune, Goddess of the Harvest, some ancient benediction granted as part of the agreement hundreds of years ago, that while the Gods were gone as part of the national punishment, their children should live by the superiority of their dairy. Diary and butter are so important in Frewyn that they are used in their tea and meals as must as they are used as expletives and euphemisms. Bhi Chune Bainne, translated as by Chune’s milk, is one of the most ubiquitous phrases on the farms. It is also one of the most vulgar, if you understand it correctly, and having spent many months a happy prisoner of the farms, it becomes apparent why farmers term grant the title of Chune’s Daughters to the dairy maids—it has little to do with their profession and everything to do with their features. Iarth, a type of butter fermented in the bogs of Westren, is not only used as a heady spread but as a mild swear, one that is acceptable to say in the presence of young ears, though that has never stopped a Westrener from being more vulgar than propriety should otherwise admit. Butter smooths the edges of many tongues, especially when the attached mouths are busy with biscuits.   

Martje’s method: Only thing you need to make a good butter biscuit is good butter, and fer that, you need Frewyn butter. They don’t got good butter in other places. I know ‘cause I tasted it. Livanese

goat butter, Lucentian bean butter or whatever they call it, and even Marridon butter don’t stand sideways to the barn when next to the Frewyn bricks. Don’t use any o’ that northern grain-fed guff in my kitchen, ‘cause it’s a pale flavourless swill when it melts. The butter you want’s a golden colour, nice and thick when you lay it on, salted ‘cause there’s no use havin’ it any way else, and it’s gotta have that scent, that warm cream scent waftin’ aff it when its been out. Good butter is good on its own, don’t need nothin’ but a bit o’ fresh bread to melt it, and that’ll do you right as raccammode. Shayne loves a good butter slice, and everyone on the farms grows up eatin’ it. Some folk say we Frewyns’re born hardy, but I think it's the butter what does it. We got a wealth o’ land, and you ain’t never seen a hill with green on it till you seen our fields. That’s ten shades o’ green on one plot, and green here means gold later on. There are two things in Frewyn my brother Shirse says smell like money: butter and fertilizer, the cuttin’ clove we mostly sell away and the butter we mostly eat ourselves. It don’t seem like much when yer cuttin’ into the brick day after day, but we eat our butter by the pound, ‘specially in the winter. Butter with a bit o’ potatoes and greens—that’s a meal, one what’ll keep you goin’ th’while. Butter biscuits are the most famous biscuits on the farms: they’re easy to make, and nearly every larder’s got enough butter innit to do at least two batches at once. The best butter biscuits are the simplest: salted butter, flour, sugar, and shies shin—I gotta say salted ‘cause while in Frewyn we salt all our butter like normal folk do, this here book might reach the north where they dunno what right is. They ain’t never even heard o’ butter in Bellatrim. All they got is lard and sadness up there.

A plain butter biscuit should be one part sugar, two parts butter, three parts flour, but the secret to makin’ ‘em well and gettin’ a good paste on yer dough is to melt the sugar in with the butter. Take your one part sugar and put it right into the pot. Once it starts to melt down, add yer two parts butter, and make sure the heat is low enough so the butter don’t burn, ‘cause once it starts to turn, that’s you startin’ over again. Once the sugar and butter is melted well, add it to the three parts flour and mix till the dough comes aff at the sides, like a moldable clay. Once you got that, break aff bits, roll ‘em in yer hands, then flatten ‘em out, no more’n half inch thick, else it won’t bake right on the inside. Make as many as you like and bake ‘em at a high heat for a good twenty minutes, but watch ‘em to make sure they don’t start turnin’.

If you don’t wanna do a biscuit, you can always do a nice burl. Best thing about a good butter biscuit dough is you can add anything to it and it’ll keep its consistency. I like to do a chocolate burl, but chocolate in the mix, ‘cause it saves me the trouble o’ bothering to make hardening chocolate. I know Betsiegh down at the bakery does a chocolate covered burl with nuts and whatever rolled on it. I don’t care for it, nor most o’ her bakes, but if yer wantin’ to make it a bit more festive and all, I suppose you can roll ‘em in crushed walnuts or almonds and such. I start my burls by melting the chocolate, usually do about half a pound, then a quarter pound o’ the icin’ sugar, just to make it melt in smoother with the chocolate. Once that’s melted, melt in the butter, half a pound or so dependin’ on how many burls yer wantin’, a dash o’ vanilla, a bit o’ almond extract if you want ‘em real fancy and all, then put that in with the flour. Make the dough into a paste and roll ‘em into little balls. Then you can roll ‘em in nuts or some granulated sugar, whatever you like. Bake ‘em on a tray, so the fixin’ don’t get all over then oven, ‘cause if you don’t, yer gonna be cleanin’ those little nut bits from the oven for a month, I’ll tell you that fer nothin’. Bake in a high heat for about twenty minutes or so. Don’t get fancy now and try to glaze ‘em with lemon icin’ or nothin’. You can do a different batch with a bit o lemon and lavender inside, or as you like, but the point of butter biscuits and burls is to always have the aftertaste o’ the butter spreadin’ in yer mouth. And remember what I said: you better use the good golden salted butter, ‘cause I don’t wanna hear you cryin’ about how your biscuits and burls don’t taste right. That’s me warnin’ you.