Buttermilk Biscuits

a recipe

When the kids brought friends home for sleepovers, they often requested biscuits. They may have been showing me off (biscuits are a lot less common in family kitchens up north here than pancakes are) or they may have been leveraging my vanity to get themselves some biscuits. Either way, I usually fell for it. Scratch biscuits are a pain to make, no doubt. But they’re also light, rich, flaky, and impressive. I try to give myself a head start the night before, mixing the dry ingredients and cutting in the butter; then, in the morning, I add the buttermilk, and roll, cut, and bake the biscuits. It feels more like magic that way. It’s also close to the way the train porter managed to make biscuits so quickly for the General Mills exec who was so impressed he was inspired to steal the method invent Bisquick. For that invention story, see 1930s Bisquick Ads I Have Loved. For more about my feelings on scratch cooking in general and biscuits/Bisquick in particular, see

Bisquicks

Please comment with recipe compliments, corrections, and complaints. This recipe has evolved since I first started making biscuits and with your help it will evolve even more.

Yield: about 2 dozen 2–3-inch biscuits

Ingredients:

5 cups (700 g) all purpose flour
1½ Tbsp. (15 g) baking powder
1 tsp. (5 g) baking soda
2 tsp. (12 g) table salt
1 Tbsp. (10 g) white sugar
¼ cup (50 g) shortening, lard, or coconut oil
1 stick cold butter, cut into 24 pieces
2 cups buttermilk

Steps:

Place a rack in the upper third of the oven and preheat the oven to 500°F. (That blast of heat right on top helps these rise.)

Place a large bowl on your kitchen scale to measure all the dry ingredients. (You don’t have a kitchen scale? Oh dear. Use volume measurements and put the dry ingredients directly into the food processor.) Transfer flour mixture to the bowl of your food processor and pulse three times to blend. Add shortening (or coconut oil or lard) and thoroughly blend it in. Add butter pieces and pulse six times, until the butter is the size of small peas.

Empty the mixture into a large bowl. Get your hands in and feel through it and if you find some big chunks of butter, flatten them between your fingers. Add the buttermilk and stir with a spatula or wooden spoon until you all the dry flour is picked up from the bottom of the bowl. Dump onto a well-floured counter. Press together and then knead a couple of times until it’s a thing, pat into a rectangle, roll out a bit, and fold into thirds like a letter. Roll out again and fold into thirds like a letter. Let it rest while you clean your food processor and mixing bowl and put all your ingredients away. Roll out again to a thickness of about a half inch and cut with a 2-3 inch biscuit cutter. You’ll need to re-roll once or twice.

Place biscuits on a greased cookie sheet and bake on a high shelf of your oven for five minutes. Rotate. Bake for five more minutes (unless it’s looking too brown — use your judgment). Move to a middle shelf and bake possibly five minutes more until the biscuits are high and light and the bottoms are brown. (If not all your biscuits fit on one sheet, don’t use two — refrigerate the raw ones and wait for the second batch. Two batches at once compromises the rise.) Pile into a basket and bask in the scratch baker’s glow. Oh — and have a biscuit. With more butter, of course.

Notes:

• You can replace a cup of the white flour with wheat flour (for color/flavor) or cake flour (for tenderness) without compromising your rise.

• I always use salted butter because I like salt. Literally the only thing I use unsalted butter for is frosting.

• I do not see why this wouldn’t work with good vegan butter. I’ve read Earth Balance Vegan Buttery Sticks is a good option, but I haven’t tested them. Testers, please!

• It’s been years since I did this without my trusty food processor. If I had to make biscuits without it I’d wimp out and find a recipe for cream biscuits, like this one. They won’t have the height or the flakiness, but no one will complain.

• To make ahead somewhat: combine the dry ingredients, mix in the solid fat, and cut in the butter. Pour into a bowl for mixing the next day or a ziploc bag for freezing indefinitely.

• To make ahead more: cut out the biscuit dough and freeze flat on their cookie sheet. Then transfer the dough discs into ziploc bags. Thaw before baking. (You can bake from frozen, at 450°, but they won’t be as tall.)

• To make ahead completely: make completely. They freeze well. Either thaw and reheat at 350° or thaw for a few seconds in the microwave, slice, and toast.