Desserts · Cakes & loaves

Strawberry shortcake

Name: Strawberry shortcake
Prep time: 25 min
Cook time: 18 min
Total time: 43 min
Yield: 8 servings
Ingredients: 1 1/2 lb strawberries, hulled, sliced; 1/4 cup granulated sugar; 2 tsp juice lemon; 2 1/3 cups all-purpose flour; 3 tbsp granulated sugar; 1 tbsp baking powder; 1/2 tsp salt; 7 tbsp butter, frozen, grated; 3/4 cup + 1 tbsp low-fat buttermilk, cold; 1 cup heavy cream, whipped

June on a plate: macerated strawberries and whipped cream between split buttermilk biscuits. Not sponge, not cake — the American original is a biscuit.

Time: 43 min (25 prep + 18 cook)
Servings: 8
Per serving: 406 kcal
Protein: 7 g

Both directions are legitimate — the score measures fullness per calorie, not virtue. Every version is the same dish, rebalanced.

Ingredients

Berries

1 1/2 lb strawberries, hulled, sliced700 g
1/4 cup granulated sugar50 g
2 tsp juice lemon10 g

Biscuits

2 1/3 cups all-purpose flour280 g
3 tbsp granulated sugar45 g
1 tbsp baking powder12 g
1/2 tsp salt3 g
7 tbsp butter, frozen, grated100 g
3/4 cup + 1 tbsp low-fat buttermilk, cold200 g

Cream

1 cup heavy cream, whipped240 g

Every ingredient links to its food page — same data, same score, same formula.

Steps

Toss the strawberries with the sugar and lemon and leave them 30 minutes. The syrup they release is the sauce — this step is the recipe.
Rub the frozen grated butter into the dry biscuit ingredients, stir in the cold buttermilk to a shaggy dough, pat to 2 cm (¾ inch) and cut 8 rounds.
Bake at 220°C for 15–18 minutes until golden. Cool slightly.
Split each biscuit, spoon berries and syrup over the bottom half, whipped cream, lid on top. Assemble at the table; assembled early, they go to mush.

Why this score

engineered against fullness

Concentrated sugar, with little protein or fiber to slow it down; dense calories with little protein, volume or fiber to fill you up.

Three routes to fullness — one is enough

7% of kcal

56% water

7 g/Mcal

What pulls it down

37%

How scores work

Computed on the finished dish, not an average of the parts: 3251 kcal goes into the pot, 1640 g of ingredients comes out as ~1400 g of food → 232 kcal per 100 g. Cooking moves water, and energy density is the score's biggest lever — so we show the math. Full formula here.

Per

Calories: 232
Protein: (7%); 4 g
Fat: (48%); 13 g
Carbohydrates: (45%); 27 g
of which sugar: 10 g
Fiber: 2 g
Sodium: 215 mg

Percentages are the share of calories from each macronutrient.

Computed from the ingredients' USDA data — nothing typed by hand. Every number is traceable, every score recomputable.

More desserts

Photo: AI-generated. Nutrition and score are computed from the ingredients with the published formula — this recipe hasn't been kitchen-tested by us yet.