Florey, I well remember your Fifties version. But you're right, I think the tendency today is to assemble shortly before serving. Those 'fifties homemakers had more time, I sometimes think, and planned ahead.

We used to tease my Mom about waking us up in the morning and immediately asking, "How about liver and onions tonight?" Ugh and LOL Not something you want to consider before you've even brushed your teeth.

I'll sometimes slice and sugar strawberries lightly but we mostly add to cereal or just eat a bowl as is. josh

Try this. Halve strawberries. Let soak overnight in their own juice. Sugar lightly. Next morning bake biscuits from scratch. Open biscuits while hot from oven, ladle on strawberries. Drench with heavy cream. Have this for breakfast once a week for a year I guarantee at the end of a year you'll be so fat you'll waddle like a duck. But what a way to go. yyyyyyyaahhhhooooooo. Steve in Baltimore County

I suspect I grew up on shortcake more like Steve mentions, and it had nothing to do with time but just the way my family always made it. I don't like the base to soak up the juice and get squishy. I like the contrast in textures of the flaky shortcake, the brickle fresh berries and the juice to mix with the cream or whipped cream.

My mother made a shortcake base out of sweetened biscuit dough, as do I. She cut them with a biscuit cutter. So do I, unless I'm in a hurry and then just bake the whole batch of dough in a shallow pan.

Not that I'd push yours away either! LOL. It would disappear if you sat it in front of me rather quickly.

I do like trifle, and for that I like to use sponge cake, angel food, or lady's fingers. Actually any type of cake if I have it to spare will do. That's the point, to use up cake. So, I guess I do bend on sogging up a cake now and again.

Yuk on squishiness, and hooray for sweetened biscuits, the whole thing assembled just before eating. And "real" whipped cream to top it off.

I grew up on a farm and we had a huge strawberry patch. We ate strawberry shortcake several times a week. It's a wonder I don't weight 200 pounds.

My mother said when she had strawberry shortcake as a kid it was their supper, so if that ws all you ate, you wouldn't get too fat!

And what happens to that whipped cream when it sits on the berries and Lady fingers? LADY FINGERS? Strawberry shortcake by definition is made with short biscuits. Trifle is made with lady fingers or sponge cake.
I like my shortcake best while the biscuit is still warm the berries just getting juicy and the cream freshly whipped....or perhaps not even whipped....just poured!
Oh dear....can I stand to wait until next June!
Linda C

I had never heard of using biscuits [or a bisuit-type shortcake] until I was long past voting age. Everyone used sponge cakes (baked in muffin tins, so each was a serving) and ladled the syrupy strawberries over, topping with whipped cream and freshly sliced berries. I suppose that makes it more like a single-layer trifle :) but I find the thought of using a coarse biscuit-type singularly unappealing, since my tastebuds believe a strawberry shortcake should taste like fresh berries on a sweet cloud. And no, it was never assembled until just before serving. Berries were picked in the early afternoon, cleaned and sugared; but they didn't meet the cake until moments before being eaten.

We used the sponge cake too, but did the strawberries like Steve said. So we assembled the dish right before serving & used the juice from the bowl that the cut strawberries were in. I wouldn't want the cake part (or the strawberries) too squishy, which is what I'd think they would be if the whole dish sat assembled over night. The difference in textures is part of what makes it so good.

My mother did the biscuit thing if she felt like taking the time, otherwise it was lady fingers. I liked them both, maybe the biscuits a little more. I think it's been 30 years since I've had homemade strawberry shortcake. Shame on me.

Hi, sorry to be away so long.
Squishy and dissolved, are not yummy. What I'm trying to find is, a recipe, for shortcake, that stands up to the juice that the sweetened strawberries make.
Butter the size of an egg, wont work, it's got to be about a cup.
Is there a type of flour [ bread, cake, or other, winter?], that will really stand up to the juice, and not go mushy?
Are there other mush resistant recipe secrets?

Homemade, hot, barely sweet, shortcake biscuits are the best, for an eye rollingly, whoopingly good, shortcake.

Ladyfingers, then Spongecake are the fall back options. Sponge cake, is best well soaked, because it can and does stand up to the juice, like when you poke holes in an orange cake, for the glaze. cake. The whipped cream does look awful after a while,, but you can save a 1/2" of cream in the carton to whip up the next day, to hide the old stuff. I like it best around 4 hours, only once did it ever last past breakfast.

If that shortcake has been soaking since
Oct 11th------------Steve in Baltimore County