It's interesting that the motion is called that, because any biscuits I've ever made get tough and not flaky if you knead them too much. And too much is pretty much anything more than the bare minimum required to get them to hold together.
Biscuits (in the US sense) are more like a chemically leavened pie crust than a yeast leavened bread.
I like the term “making biscuits” better than “kneading” or “kneading biscuits”. Butter biscuits (and scones) usually require handwork to integrate the butter into the dry ingredients. In my experience, this handwork pretty closely resembles what the cats are doing. There’s a lot of squeezing going on to break up the cold butter and mix it in.
There was a old type of biscuit in Maryland that was not leavened with chemicals but aerated by beating. Kneading would make them too tough of course. I don't understand the technique exactly and someday I'd like to try making a batch, although it would be better to find a place I can try a real one first if that still exists.
In Italian I've seen a bunch of names for the kneading: pigiare la lana (to tread the wool), fare il pane (to make [knead] bread), and la danza del latte (the milk dance). I think that the first two are references to the movement, just like "making biscuits"; except that bread actually improves as you knead it, unlike biscuits.
As in Portuguese it's just "amassar pãozinho", or roughly "to knead bread", with a [likely affectionate] diminutive.
mauvehaus|2 years ago
Biscuits (in the US sense) are more like a chemically leavened pie crust than a yeast leavened bread.
If it's not obvious, I'm not a serious baker.
strkitten|2 years ago
dendrite9|2 years ago
https://atasteofhistorywithjoycewhite.blogspot.com/2015/03/m...
https://libapps.salisbury.edu/nabb-online/exhibits/show/baki...
Gordonjcp|2 years ago
So that made "biscuits and gravy" sound a lot more appealing.
chaosjevil|2 years ago
As in Portuguese it's just "amassar pãozinho", or roughly "to knead bread", with a [likely affectionate] diminutive.
searealist|2 years ago
FfejL|2 years ago
polar8|2 years ago
hinkley|2 years ago