Biscuits.
Well I've been talking about them throughout my posts. I love biscuits. They're so versatile, easy and yummy. I started making biscuits from scratch a few years ago. Growing up we usually had the canned or frozen biscuits. At Christmas we would have these great sausage biscuits that my grandmother would make. They were made with buttermilk and had the sausage mixed in. I love them with butter and jam.
Once I realized that biscuits weren't that difficult to make, I only make my own now. The ingredients are pretty straightforward and I usually have them around the house: flour, baking powder, salt, possibly sugar, butter and milk. I've done whole wheat biscuits, half white-half wheat biscuits, and your traditional white flour biscuits.
I'm not real picky about biscuits. Use what you have and they'll be good. I don't usually keep buttermilk around so I'll use whatever milk I have. I do usually try to use butter, it works better with baking and I usually have some around. You can use some sugar or not. And I usually use whatever flour I have on hand. I used to just use the top of a glass to cut my biscuits but I did buy some biscuit cutters which I love having.
My keys to good biscuits:
- you need to kneed the dough. Some people will say you don't have to but if you want a great, tall, flaky biscuit, you need to kneed the dough for a few turns. Flatten the dough, fold it on itself one or two times, flatten again and repeat the process. It helps if you turn the dough different directions during this process.
- DO use some sort of cutter. If you just shape the biscuits on their own, they won't get a good rise either. They need the cut edge to get more air in the biscuit. Your biscuits will be fine if you don't do this, they just will be flatter and denser.
- a pastry cutter is a very helpful tool to have. They're fairly inexpensive and work so much easier than a fork. Now some will use a food processor but I don't like mine so I use it as little as possible. Besides, less mess to clean up if you don't use a food processor.
- I love cooking mine on a baking stone. But cooking them on a pan works fine too. I don't preheat my stone usually (my instructions told me not to!).
- You can freeze biscuits but they just aren't the same. I've tried freezing them without cooking them and they won't rise as much. I don't know about freezing them after they've cooked but I don't think they'd taste the same. Also how would you reheat them? Seems like they might overcook if you reheat them in the oven.
Anyway...
My basic recipe adapted from my mom's old (1950s edition) Better Homes and Gardens cookbook (love it!) is:
Standard Biscuits
2 c flour
1/2 t salt
3 t baking powder
4 T cold butter
3/4 c. milk
Preheat oven to 450 degrees.
Mix flour with salt and baking powder. Cut the butter into pieces about 1/2 T in size. Mix in with the dry ingredients and using either a pastry cutter or a fork, mix everything together until the butter is in pieces throughout the flour mixture (bigger chunks aren't a bad thing). Add the milk and mix together until everything holds together. Take out the dough onto a floured surface. Knead the dough for a minute or two.
The way I like to knead the dough is to press it out, then fold it into half or thirds. Turn the dough 90 degrees and repeat. Also you can flip the dough over and repeat. I find the more you knead, the more the biscuits rise and get fluffy. But you don't want to over-do it.
Roll the dough out using either a rolling pin or your hands. Usually you want it to be about 1/2 inch thick but thicker is ok. The thicker your dough, the less biscuits you'll get.
Cut with a biscuit cutter (or cookie cutter or if you're desperate, you can use the open part of a cup). Bake on a ungreased cookie sheet or stone for 12-15 minutes. Can make up to 16 biscuits.
Usually I get about a dozen larger sized biscuits out of this recipe.
You can also adapt this recipe. You can use up to a 1/2 cup butter (1 stick), add 2 teaspoons of sugar, add some more baking powder and cream of tartar, use buttermilk, or do half all-purpose flour, half whole wheat flour. And if you're in a hurry, you can just drop the dough on the baking sheet - no kneading, no rolling out, no cutting. Just take spoonfuls and put on the baking sheet.
Our family recipe for Sausage Biscuits:
¾ lb. sausage (mild) 2 2/3 c. flour
2 T. sugar 1 t. baking powder
½ t. baking soda ½ t. salt
½ c. margarine 1 pkg. dry yeast
¼ c. warm water melted margarine
1 c. buttermilk
Cook sausage in skillet until browned, stirring to crumble. Drain well and set aside.
Combine sugar, flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt and mix well. Cut in margarine into flour mixture while mixing with food processor or pastry cutter until mixture resembles a coarse meal.
Dissolve yeast in warm water and let stand for 5 minutes. Add yeast mixture to buttermilk, stirring well. Add buttermilk mixture to dry ingredients, stirring until the dry ingredients are moistened.
Knead in sausage.
Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead lightly 3 or 4 times.
Roll dough into ½ inch thickness and cut with a 1 ¾ inch round cutter (or to preference). Place biscuits on an ungreased baking sheet. Brush tops with melted butter. Bake at 425° for 10 minutes. Or you can freeze them on a baking sheet and transfer to plastic bags, when frozen. If baking biscuits from the freezer, you may need a few more minutes on the cook time.
You can find a good 100% whole wheat biscuit recipe here:
http://www.100daysofrealfood.com/2010/04/08/super-easy-recipe-whole-wheat-biscuits/
You can also add things like bacon, cheese, sweet potato or chives to your biscuit, depending on what you're going to eat them with.
We like to have gravy biscuits sometimes but we don't always want all the fat or grease in the gravy. We have started making a nutritional yeast gravy that is healthier and tastes pretty good. Here's our recipe if you'd like to give it a try.
In a sauce pan, brown yeast and flour (dry).
Nutritional yeast can be found usually in the baking section or some stores sell it in bulk. It's a great thing to keep on hand. Here's a great blog post about the stuff: http://blog.fatfreevegan.com/2011/10/what-the-heck-is-nutritional-yeast.html
Well I've been talking about them throughout my posts. I love biscuits. They're so versatile, easy and yummy. I started making biscuits from scratch a few years ago. Growing up we usually had the canned or frozen biscuits. At Christmas we would have these great sausage biscuits that my grandmother would make. They were made with buttermilk and had the sausage mixed in. I love them with butter and jam.
Once I realized that biscuits weren't that difficult to make, I only make my own now. The ingredients are pretty straightforward and I usually have them around the house: flour, baking powder, salt, possibly sugar, butter and milk. I've done whole wheat biscuits, half white-half wheat biscuits, and your traditional white flour biscuits.
I'm not real picky about biscuits. Use what you have and they'll be good. I don't usually keep buttermilk around so I'll use whatever milk I have. I do usually try to use butter, it works better with baking and I usually have some around. You can use some sugar or not. And I usually use whatever flour I have on hand. I used to just use the top of a glass to cut my biscuits but I did buy some biscuit cutters which I love having.
My keys to good biscuits:
- you need to kneed the dough. Some people will say you don't have to but if you want a great, tall, flaky biscuit, you need to kneed the dough for a few turns. Flatten the dough, fold it on itself one or two times, flatten again and repeat the process. It helps if you turn the dough different directions during this process.
- DO use some sort of cutter. If you just shape the biscuits on their own, they won't get a good rise either. They need the cut edge to get more air in the biscuit. Your biscuits will be fine if you don't do this, they just will be flatter and denser.
- a pastry cutter is a very helpful tool to have. They're fairly inexpensive and work so much easier than a fork. Now some will use a food processor but I don't like mine so I use it as little as possible. Besides, less mess to clean up if you don't use a food processor.
- I love cooking mine on a baking stone. But cooking them on a pan works fine too. I don't preheat my stone usually (my instructions told me not to!).
- You can freeze biscuits but they just aren't the same. I've tried freezing them without cooking them and they won't rise as much. I don't know about freezing them after they've cooked but I don't think they'd taste the same. Also how would you reheat them? Seems like they might overcook if you reheat them in the oven.
Anyway...
My basic recipe adapted from my mom's old (1950s edition) Better Homes and Gardens cookbook (love it!) is:
Standard Biscuits
2 c flour
1/2 t salt
3 t baking powder
4 T cold butter
3/4 c. milk
Preheat oven to 450 degrees.
Mix flour with salt and baking powder. Cut the butter into pieces about 1/2 T in size. Mix in with the dry ingredients and using either a pastry cutter or a fork, mix everything together until the butter is in pieces throughout the flour mixture (bigger chunks aren't a bad thing). Add the milk and mix together until everything holds together. Take out the dough onto a floured surface. Knead the dough for a minute or two.
The way I like to knead the dough is to press it out, then fold it into half or thirds. Turn the dough 90 degrees and repeat. Also you can flip the dough over and repeat. I find the more you knead, the more the biscuits rise and get fluffy. But you don't want to over-do it.
Roll the dough out using either a rolling pin or your hands. Usually you want it to be about 1/2 inch thick but thicker is ok. The thicker your dough, the less biscuits you'll get.
Cut with a biscuit cutter (or cookie cutter or if you're desperate, you can use the open part of a cup). Bake on a ungreased cookie sheet or stone for 12-15 minutes. Can make up to 16 biscuits.
Usually I get about a dozen larger sized biscuits out of this recipe.
You can also adapt this recipe. You can use up to a 1/2 cup butter (1 stick), add 2 teaspoons of sugar, add some more baking powder and cream of tartar, use buttermilk, or do half all-purpose flour, half whole wheat flour. And if you're in a hurry, you can just drop the dough on the baking sheet - no kneading, no rolling out, no cutting. Just take spoonfuls and put on the baking sheet.
Our family recipe for Sausage Biscuits:
¾ lb. sausage (mild) 2 2/3 c. flour
2 T. sugar 1 t. baking powder
½ t. baking soda ½ t. salt
½ c. margarine 1 pkg. dry yeast
¼ c. warm water melted margarine
1 c. buttermilk
Cook sausage in skillet until browned, stirring to crumble. Drain well and set aside.
Combine sugar, flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt and mix well. Cut in margarine into flour mixture while mixing with food processor or pastry cutter until mixture resembles a coarse meal.
Dissolve yeast in warm water and let stand for 5 minutes. Add yeast mixture to buttermilk, stirring well. Add buttermilk mixture to dry ingredients, stirring until the dry ingredients are moistened.
Knead in sausage.
Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead lightly 3 or 4 times.
Roll dough into ½ inch thickness and cut with a 1 ¾ inch round cutter (or to preference). Place biscuits on an ungreased baking sheet. Brush tops with melted butter. Bake at 425° for 10 minutes. Or you can freeze them on a baking sheet and transfer to plastic bags, when frozen. If baking biscuits from the freezer, you may need a few more minutes on the cook time.
You can find a good 100% whole wheat biscuit recipe here:
http://www.100daysofrealfood.com/2010/04/08/super-easy-recipe-whole-wheat-biscuits/
You can also add things like bacon, cheese, sweet potato or chives to your biscuit, depending on what you're going to eat them with.
We like to have gravy biscuits sometimes but we don't always want all the fat or grease in the gravy. We have started making a nutritional yeast gravy that is healthier and tastes pretty good. Here's our recipe if you'd like to give it a try.
Heath’s Nutritional Yeast Gravy
½ c. nutritional yeast
4 T flour
1 T EVOO
2 c (at most) hot water
4 t. soy sauce
spices - salt, pepper, sage, garlic (optional)
other things you could add - coffee, paprika, cayenne, maple syrup
In a sauce pan, brown yeast and flour (dry).
Add oil and stir together.
Slowly add water to reach desired consistency.
Add soy sauce and spices.Nutritional yeast can be found usually in the baking section or some stores sell it in bulk. It's a great thing to keep on hand. Here's a great blog post about the stuff: http://blog.fatfreevegan.com/2011/10/what-the-heck-is-nutritional-yeast.html
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