[3][4] Shortcake is typically made with flour, sugar, baking powder or soda, salt, butter, milk or cream, and sometimes eggs.

The shortcakes are split, and the bottoms are covered with a layer of strawberries, juice, and whipped cream, typically flavored with sugar and vanilla.

[8] However, that recipe describes an unleavened cookie or biscuit (in the English sense), made of flour, cream, sugar, egg yolk and spices.

A June 1862 issue of the Genesse Farmer (Rochester) described a "Strawberry Shortcake" made up of layers of soda biscuit, fresh berries, sugar, and cream.

A similar recipe appeared in Jennie June's American Cookery Book (1866) by Jane Cunningham Croly.

[9] The first known cookbook by a black woman in the United States, A Domestic Cook Book (1866) by Malinda Russell,[13] also contains a recipe.

[15] The city of Lebanon, Oregon, holds the Strawberry Festival each year on the first full weekend of June.