buttermilk biscuits

Baking scares me just a little… ok quite a lot. Do one tiny thing incorrectly and you end up with Frisbee discs and hockey pucks instead of pancakes and biscuits. My formal baking education amounts to Paul Hollywood’s narrative on The Great British Baking show (I may have binge watched all three seasons in the span of a week). Other than that I have tried to learn from the “greats” in the baking world, which, to me, are my grandmother Stacy, my dad, and Google.

These buttermilk biscuits are ready in a flash, dare I say easy to make, and, ahem, obviously delicious. Also, I am not going to apologize for the amount of butter in these biscuits. Once you try them, you will understand. If you have an extra dollar or two, buy some fancy grass fed butter and buttermilk (you will not regret it). And if you do regret it, let me know and I will begrudgingly send you two dollars for your effort.

My main reason for learning a thing or two about baking (as I would much rather cook and experiment my little heart away), is that I want to eat (whenever I want) all that the baking world has to offer. One of my favorite ways to eat these is to make especially large biscuits (6 instead of 8) and turn them into a breakfast sandwich stuffed with avocado, bacon, tomato, and a fried egg.

BUTTERMILK BISCUITS

makes 8 biscuits

2 1/2 cups (320g) all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon sugar
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon table salt
10 tablespoons chilled unsalted butter, cut into small chunks
1 cup chilled buttermilk, plus 1 or 2 tablespoons if needed

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Lightly grease (or line with parchment paper) one baking sheet.

Whisk dry ingredients together in a medium bowl. Cut in the butter with a fork or pastry cutter until the largest chunks are about the size of a pea. Slowly mix in 1 cup of buttermilk with fork, until just barely combined. If needed, add 1or 2 tablespoons of buttermilk to help the dough just barely hold together.

Gather the dough together into one large clump on a lightly floured surface. Divide dough in half, then each half into four equal rounds.

Place on prepared cookie sheet, each biscuit at least 2 inches apart and bake for approximately 14-16 minutes or until lightly browned.