Some more important information before you ride. As you would already know an engine does not work without fuel, and some of the VicHPV Community members have great "fuel" recipes.

I've been using these biscuits as the staple for lunch for cross-country skiing for over 30 years and have taken them on rides. Alan

TARARUA BISCUITS

NZ Long-life high-energy bushwalking biscuits. Makes >50 biscuits each 25g. (about 150g or 200g biscuits=lunch.)

Melt margarine and mix into dry ingredients. Melt malt extract in some hot water (approx. 1/2cup) then add to mix. Add Almond essence and enough extra warm water to make soft dough.

Roll out to 5-6mm thick on a floured board, cut into rounds with egg-ring (75mm). [Or roll into 1-inch balls and press into an egg-ring. ] Bake 180oC Fan-Forced 15-20min (up to 30-40min normal oven) until partly golden brown.

Some people have suggested they are only truly cooked if, when you drop one on a tile, the biscuit stays whole and the tile breaks. Darker brown makes them harder. Lighter brown reduces their shelf life but may preserve your teeth.

*[Original recipe used butter and had no cinnamon or almond essence. It suggested adding dry fruit as an option. There are many variations on the web.]

After a recent ride, Chris' scones were the hot topic, she has kindly provided us with details, for all to enjoy

Standard and alternative scones, with opinions.

(alternative ingredients in brackets)

Oven temperature ..Hot 250c

Method

Mix dry ingredients in a bowl. Rub butter or oil into the flour mixture. I use a small food processor to cut the butter into one cup of flour then stir it through the rest. Oil doesn't seem to work so well with the food processor method, but it is easy to mix in with your fingers. Add sufficient of your chosen liquid to make a soft dough. I usually use a bit more than specified in the recipe, I like to have the mixture just this side of too wet, it helps to minimise the stirring up necessary to combine dry and liquid ingredients. As for stirring and kneading, the less the better.

Tip the dough onto a floured board , spinkle more flour over if you need to handle the dough. Smooth into a slab about 1 inch, 2 and a bit cms, thick and cut into rectangles or use a scone cutter for circles. If in doubt, aim for thicker rather than thinner. Rectangles save you from having to rehandle the off cuts from the circles.

Put on a floured baking tray. Put the scones fairly close together. They help each other up that way, it doesn't matter if they stick to each other a bit. Cook in a hot oven for 10 - 12 minutes. Avoid using fan forcing in the oven if you can, it forms a crust too quickly and kind of locks down the scones so they can't rise so well. Yoghurt in the milk helps the rising work as well as adding complexity to the flavour. Using buttermilk is similar, even a squeeze of lemon in the milk. The soda water fizzes up in a most satisfying fashion, but I think it is probably the mild acid in the water that works like the yoghurt in the milk to work with the rising. It might be worth trying plain water with a dash of lemon or vinegar.

Variations

Fruit scones; add 1/2 cup of your favourite dried fruit to the dry mixture before adding liquid.

Savoury scones; omit sugar, add a pinch of cayenne pepper, and 2 teaspoons of dry mustard, and 1 cup of grated cheese if you can tolerate it, and or a handful of choppped herbs.

Other applications

Dumplings; drop spoonsful of plain or savoury dough onto a stew or frankfurts and sauerkraut, cover and steam for 10 - 15 minutes.

Use plain or savoury dough instead of pastry for a change on top of pie filling.

Drop spoonsful of scone plain dough into the boiling syrup, cover with a lid and steam for 10 - 15 minutes. Serve with cream, ice cream or custard. This quantity of syrup does for about 1/4 of the scone recipe.

Check the links page for more pre ride info.