I was hoping to get all four recipes tested before Passover and bought strawberries, and cream. Then I thought I'd at least get the main two done, but the second one is big and I never got the fridge space for a whole assembled cake. Now we're past the cease gluten and yeast time, so it's not going to happen and I should tell you about trial #1. It's the one biscuit style one I thought sounded good before the thread we just had (#3 and #4 come from that thread). NYT Recipe from "Jane Grigson's Fruit Book" which I think said it was first published in the Times 30 years ago.

This is a sweetened biscuit style shortcake with a goodly amount of cream. I made it pretty much as directed, though a half batch, and I buttered the top, not just the center, and didn't open to rebutter after baking. This recipe has you lightly knead and roll the dough, then butter one cutout and stack another on top to bake. I used an unbleached AP with 11.5% protein, but with all that butter and cream it was very tender. The yield for a half batch was three doubled shortcakes and a good sized tester. The bottom came out with a nice crispness that had crunch without being tough. The crumb was soft and not too sweet, not too salty, though I think it could have used just a little more salt--scaling salt is notoriously tricky. There was a little of that sticks-to-the-roof-of-your-mouthness that comes with a moist high fat content, but it was fluffy and tender enough to dissolve right away.

Over all I get why so many people lauded the recipe. I thought the two biscuit presentation, while elegant, wasn't as good as a fork split center, catching all the drips. That, especially, because I did my own thing with the berries and cream. Just a little sugar on the berries to intensify the flavor because they were already perfect--I would have just served them plain if I weren't testing shortcakes. And a literal pinch of sugar, and a little splash of Cointreau in the cream, instead of vanilla. As it was, there wasn't any soaking in, especially with the buttered surface. Crannies and cracks, people! One of the (curated) commenters said she'd baked them up as singles and they came out great, which I will likely do next time.