Biscuits

 I have been searching for years to find a really good homemade biscuit recipe. I have tried more recipes than I care to admit. Some were okay. Some were destined for the garbage.

Then one day I combined ingredients from two different recipes and I was thrilled. The only challenge? I didn't write down exactly what I did.

So I did it again -- writing it all down as I went. This is that recipe. How many biscuits you get depends on the thickness of the dough. Plan for about 9-10. Pair the biscuits with sausage gravy or a homecooked Southern meal and you've got a winner.

               Biscuits

2 cups self-rising flour

1 cup buttermilk

1 teaspoon sugar

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

6 tablespoons Crisco shortening

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Sift flour. Add baking power, baking soda and sugar. Stir. Cut in the shortening using a pastry cutter. Add buttermilk, stirring just until moistened.

Pour batter onto a well-floured cloth. Knead sparingly, until coated. Roll out thickly (3/4-1 inch thick) and cut with a biscuit cutter. 

Place in a well-greased cast iron skillet. I use shortening to grease the skillet. Bake 10-15 minutes or until lightly browned on top.

Serve.

Lazy Biscuits

This is another biscuit recipe from the May 2014 issue of Southern Living magazine. This is for all us folks who never seem to have enough time.

 

Lazy Biscuits

2 1/2 cups self-rising flour
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1 1/4 cups chilled buttermilk
1/2  cup butter, melted
Parchment paper
1 tablespoons butter, melted

Preheat oven to 475 degrees. Whisk together flour and sugar in a large bowl.

Stir together buttermilk and 1/2 cup melted butter in a small bowl. (Butter will clump.) Stir buttermilk mixture into flour mixture until dough pulls away from sides of bowl. Drop dough by level scoops, 1 inch apart, onto a parchment paper-lined jelly-roll pan. (Use a 2-inch cookie scoop.)

Bake at 475 degrees for 12 minutes or until golden brown. Brush with melted butter and serve.

Makes 14.

Our Favorite Buttermilk Biscuit

The May 2014 issue of Southern Living magazine included a wonderful section on homemade biscuits. My Grandmother made the best biscuits. She had a flour bowl and just kind of threw ingredients in, mixed it all up with her hand, shaped the dough and placed it in an old greased tin pan. They were so good!!! I wanted so badly to learn how to make them but she didn't know how to teach me. She'd done it for so long, it was instinct. It didn't work when she slowed down and thought about it.

 

I doubt any of these biscuits will come close to those my Grandmother used to make, but they're sure worth a try. I probably won't use the parchment paper but I'll follow the remainder of the directions.

Our Favorite Buttermilk Biscuit

1/2 cup butter (1 stick) frozen
2 1/2 cups self-rising flour
1 cup chilled buttermilk
Parchment paper
2 tablespoons butter, melted

Preheat oven to 475 degrees. Grate frozen butter using large holes of a box grater. Toss together grated butter and flour in a medium bowl. Chill 10 minutes.

Make a well in center of mixture. Add buttermilk, and stir 15 times. Dough will be sticky.

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Lightly sprinkle flour over top of dough. Using a lightly floured rolling pin, roll dough into a 3/4-inch-thick rectangle (about 9 x 5 inches). Fold dough in half so short ends meet. Repeat rolling and folding process four more times.

Roll dough to 1/2-inch thickness. Cut with a 2 1/2-inch floured round cutter, reshaping scraps and flouring as needed.

Place dough rounds on a parchment paper-lined jelly-roll pan. Bake at 475 degrees for 15 minutes or until lightly browned. Brush with melted butter.

Makes 12 to 14 biscuits.

For Pillowy Dinner Rolls that are soft even when cool:
Cut in 1/2 cup cold shortening instead of cold butter.

For Crunchy bottom biscuits that are perfect with Sausage Gravy:
Warm a cast iron skillet in the oven and spread a bit of butter in the skillet before adding the biscuits.

Cheese Biscuits

This recipe looks like it might have come from a newspaper insert but really I have no idea. But these sure do look good!

Cheese Biscuits

2 cups all-purpose flour, plus flour for dusting the board
2 teaspoons baking powder
¼ teaspoon baking soda
Salt to taste
3 tablespoons vegetable shortening
2 cups finely grated Cheddar cheese (about 6 oz.)
2/3 cup buttermilk
3 tablespoons milk, approximately
6 tablespoons finely grated Parmesan cheese (about 1 oz.)

Preheat oven to 475 degrees.

Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Put the ingredients in a food processor and add the butter, shortening and grated Cheddar. Blend briefly until well mixed. Do not overblend this dough at any point. (If a food processor is not used, put the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a mixing bowl. Add the butter, shortening and cheese and blend, using a pastry blender or two knives.

Add the buttermilk while blending briefly a second time. Gather the dough into a ball. The dough may be wrapped tightly in freezer or plastic wrap and either frozen, if made a week ahead, or chilled overnight, or it may be rolled out immediately.

On a lightly floured board, roll out the dough one-quarter inch thick or slightly thicker. Using a biscuit cutter with a two-inch diameter, cut the dough into circles. Arrange the circles neatly on baking sheets. Gather together into a ball any remaining scraps of dough, roll out and cut out more circles. Arrange them on a baking sheet. There should be about three dozen biscuits. Brush the top of each biscuit lightly with a little milk.

Place the baking sheets on the center rack of the oven and bake about eight to 10 minutes, or until the tops of the biscuits are lightly browned. Sprinkle the top of each biscuit with a little Parmesan cheese. Continue baking for three minutes or longer, until the tops are golden brown and the biscuits are cooked through.

Yield: Eight to 10 servings

Buttery Baking Powder Biscuits

My Grandmother made the most amazing biscuits. I would love to be able to taste them one more time. Alas, she never could teach anyone how to make them. She just sort of threw everything into a flour bowl (a metal bowl that always had flour in it) and baked them. She didn’t know how to teach anyone because she never thought about how she did it. Sadly, she eventually lost the ability to make them. She went home a long time ago.

And she left behind a granddaughter who is forever searching for a wonderful biscuit recipe. I’ve got many, many recipes. I don’t know where this one came from. And it’s not like my Grandmother’s biscuits. But, hey, none of them are.

Buttery Baking Powder Biscuits

2 cups flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
½ cup cold butter or margarine
¾ cup half-and-half
Additional melted butter (about 2 tablespoons) for brushing

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

In a large bowl, mix flour, baking powder and salt. Cut the cold butter into flour mixture until coarse crumbs form, using a pastry blender or two knives. Add half-and-half, all at once, mixing gently just until a soft dough forms.

Gather dough together with your hands and transfer it to a floured board or pastry cloth. Knead gently, just enough to form dough into a uniform ball; turn to coat lightly with flour. Roll or pat dough out to about ½-inch thickness. Using a 2 ½-inch round cutter, cut dough into biscuits.

Place biscuits about 1-inch apart on an ungreased baking sheet. Brush tops lightly with melted butter. Bake until biscuits are golden brown, about 15 to 20 minutes.

Serve hot.

Makes 1 dozen.