Flaky and buttery homemade biscuits hot from the oven! I guarantee these little guys will disappear fast from the dinner table. The key to creating tender and flaky layers is how small pieces of cold butter are incorporated into the dough, as well as the process of stacking the layers. Learn to master the technique and you’ll be a hero in your household.
Use cold butter and layer the dough
To ensure separated layers when you pull the biscuit apart; first, chill the butter and then press the slices into large flat discs with your fingers. The small butter pockets melt into the dough during baking and leave holes for steam and gas to expand and make partitions in the layers.
Roll the dough, cut into 4 squares then stack them on top of each other. This adds extra layers that wouldn’t be there if you just cut the biscuits immediately after mixing and rolling out. Make straight down motions when using the biscuit cutter as any twisting motion makes them stick together on the edges and will ruin the layers.
Ingredients for homemade biscuits
All-purpose flour contains 10 to 12 percent protein to provide structure created by the gluten network formed during mixing. Leavening agents like baking soda and baking powder promotes browning and rise which also helps neutralize the acid in the buttermilk to reduce some natural tanginess.
A small amount of sugar helps accelerate golden color formation as the biscuits cook quickly in the oven. It also adds a bit of crunch. Chilled butter provides flavor and lots of mini layers in the bread. Buttermilk hydrates the flour proteins for gluten formation, keeps the biscuits moist, and adds extra flavor from the slight tanginess in the cultured milk.
Why you chill the dough
Briefly freeze the butter and flour mixture after breaking into smaller pieces, and then chill the cut out biscuits to ensure defined layers. This keeps the butter from melting into the protein network as it is mixed, rolled and shaped. The key is to create separate sheets of dough before it even goes into the oven.
Something unique about this recipe is that the dough may seem slightly dry initially. Rest assured that the lightly floured and rigid surface adds wonderful texture to the tops of the biscuits. After all your hard work, you’ll be rewarded with hot, fresh, and buttery biscuits to dip into homemade gravy or to use for eggs benedict.
Rest the biscuits before baking
Once the biscuits are cut, rest and chill before baking. This allows the gluten network to relax after all of the kneading and rolling. It also keeps the butter cold for building flaky layers. Relaxing the dough also helps the biscuits rise evenly during baking so the heights are more symmetrical and not fallen over.
Ingredients:
See next page
