Plasmon biscuits are a biscuit

Biscuit

A biscuit is a baked, edible, and commonly flour-based product. The term is used to apply to two distinctly different products in North America and the Commonwealth Nations....

 containing plasmon

Plasmon

In physics, a plasmon is a quantum of plasma oscillation. The plasmon is a quasiparticle resulting from the quantization of plasma oscillations just as photons and phonons are quantizations of light and mechanical vibrations, respectively...

, a proprietary dried milk

Milk

Milk is a white liquid produced by the mammary glands of mammals. It is the primary source of nutrition for young mammals before they are able to digest other types of food. Early-lactation milk contains colostrum, which carries the mother's antibodies to the baby and can reduce the risk of many...

. The manufacturers claimed that 3 pounds of plasmon made 100 pints of milk . Plasmon was manufactured by the International Plasmon Company and was added to a number of different products to make Plasmon Oats, Plasmon Cocoa and Plasmon Biscuits.

Plasmon biscuits were very popular around the turn of the 20th century, and were considered a health food. They were used by Ernest Shackleton

Ernest Shackleton

Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton, CVO, OBE was a notable explorer from County Kildare, Ireland, who was one of the principal figures of the period known as the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration...

 in his Antarctic Expedition of 1902. On Christmas Day he wrote "Had a hot lunch. I was cook: - Bovril

Bovril

Bovril is the trademarked name of a thick, salty meat extract, developed in the 1870s by John Lawson Johnston and sold in a distinctive, bulbous jar. It is made in Burton upon Trent, Staffordshire, owned and distributed by Unilever UK....

, chocolate and plasmon biscuit, two spoonfuls of jam each. Grand!". A variety of plasmon biscuit, said to be like digestives

Digestive biscuit

A digestive biscuit, sometimes referred to as a sweet-meal biscuit, is a semi-sweet biscuit originated in the United Kingdom and popular worldwide. The term 'digestive' is derived from the belief that they had antacid properties due to the use of sodium bicarbonate when they were first developed...

, was also made by Jacob's

Jacob's

Jacob's is a brand name for several lines of biscuits and crackers. The brand name in the Republic of Ireland is owned by Jacob Fruitfield Food Group and in the United Kingdom it is owned under license by United Biscuits.-History:...

 in 1915.

Victor Whitechurch

Victor Whitechurch

Victor Lorenzo Whitechurch was a Church of England clergyman and author.He wrote many novels on different themes. He is probably best known for his detective stories featuring Thorpe Hazell, which featured in the Strand Magazine, Railway Magazine, Pearson's and Harmsworth's Magazines...

's fictional vegetarian detective Thorpe Hazell

Thorpe Hazell

Thorpe Hazell is a fictional detective created by the British author Victor Lorenzo Whitechurch. Hazell was a vegetarian railway expert, whom the author intended to be as far from Sherlock Holmes as possible. Short stories about Thorpe Hazell appeared in the Strand Magazine, Railway Magazine,...

 ate them daily. The journal of actress Ellen Terry

Ellen Terry

Dame Ellen Terry, GBE was an English stage actress who became the leading Shakespearean actress in Britain. Among the members of her famous family is her great nephew, John Gielgud....

, records that George Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60...

"generally dined off a plasmon biscuit and a bean!". George Strachey Fawle (1856-1936), a director of the company, said he attributed his recovery from serious illness to plasmon.