December 7, 2010

Cream Biscuits

Bismillahir Rahmanir Raheem


If the thought of making home made biscuits conjures up images of pain-painstakingly cutting cold butter into flour or slaving away for hours to get them just right, then you've obviously never made cream biscuits. These come together so ridiculously fast that you'll really have no excuse not to make them.

 These are soft, tender biscuits best served straight out of the oven and slathered with butter or some good jam.But don't restrict it to just breakfast, try making a batch with your spaghetti dinner or a steaming bowl of chili. They're that good, and that easy, you'll be finding reasons just to make them!


 Biscuit Making Tips:  Handle the dough as little as possible! I know you've heard that everywhere, but there's good reason. Over handling the dough yields hard, little hockey puck-type biscuits, and no amount of jam can make a hockey puck taste good. Just mix your dough until the ingredients clump together and then stop! Don't touch! Also, when cutting out your biscuits, don't twist your cutter but rather do a quick, straight down motion. This will get you the highest possible rise out of your biscuit insha'allah. And speaking of biscuit cutters, don't worry if you don't have one. A can (like from a can of veggies) with both sides removed with a can opener, works just fine!


Sweet Cream Biscuits
(from Dorie Greenspan's Baking: From My Home to Yours)
Makes about 12 biscuits

2 cups all-purpose flour (or 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour and 1/3 cup cake flour)
1 Tbsp. baking powder
2 tsp. sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
1 to 11/4 cups heavy cream

Getting ready: Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. Get out a sharp 2-inch-diameter biscuit cutter and line a baking sheet with parchment or a silicone mat ( I used a non-stick baking sheet and all was fine).

Whisk the flour(s), baking powder, sugar and salt together in a bowl. Pour about 1 cup of the cream over the dry ingredients, grab a fork and start tossing the ingredients together. If necessary, add more cream, a spoonful at a time, until you’ve got a nice soft dough. Now reach into the bowl with your hands and give the dough a quick, gentle kneading – 3 or 4 turns should be just enough to bring everything together.

Lightly dust a work surface with flour and turn out the dough. Dust the top of the dough very lightly with flour and pat the dough out with your hands or roll it with a pin until it is about 1/2 inch high. Don’t worry if the dough isn’t completely even – a quick, light touch is more important than accuracy.

Use the biscuit cutter to cut out as many biscuits as you can. Try to cut the biscuits close to one another so you get the most you can out of this first round. By hand or with a small spatula, transfer the biscuits to the baking sheet. Gather together the scraps, working them as little as possible, pat out to a 1/2-inch thickness and cut as many additional biscuits as you can; transfer these to the sheet.Brush the tops with melted butter, if you like. (The biscuits can be made to this point and frozen on the baking sheet, then wrapped airtight and kept for up to 2 months. Bake without defrosting – just add a couple more minutes to the oven time.)

Bake the biscuits for 14 to 18 minutes, or until they are tall, puffed and golden brown. Transfer them to a serving basket.

10 comments:

  1. As my 2 yr old would say, nummyyyyy!

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  2. lol, aww, thanks! Kids' compliments are some of the highest forms of praise, in my opinion!

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  3. I will have to try this one because making biscuits is not as easy it may seem. My mom always used a glass to cut her biscuits. I miss biscuits, and once I tried making them and the results were a complete disaster. Thanks for this recipe and I cannot wait to try it!

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  4. Assalamualikum,

    WOW! Gotta try these... I can get my 3year old involved too! thanks for sharing the recipe.

    JazakaAllah

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  5. I tried them, and I should have paid more attention! Mine did come out little without much rise. I am in love with the salty southern style of my childhood. I will try adding more salt next time. Overall the recipe was easy and the biscuits were good to eat with jam and butter.

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  6. ok y'all, so I've been reading up on this recipe some more (its apparently very known) and many people have some serious issues with flat biscuits. I made these a second time and though they weren't flat, they also weren't as high and fluffy as the first time. It seems the type of flour is very important, and I've been using a whole wheat/white flour mix which probably explains my flat biscuits. Not sure what type you used UmmSumayyah? Most resources suggest using White Lily (only found in the south, of course!). But like you said, they do taste good, they just don't look as pretty as you might have imagined.

    I think its time we find a better recipe insha'allah!

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  7. I made these this morning and they turned out fine. Next time I won't roll them so thin but they still baked fluffy. I used the Walmart all purpose flour for mine. Thanks for the recipe!!!! I love this blog!!!!

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  8. Yay Rhonda, so glad to hear that! I think I need to try these again with plain white all-p flour, like you did. You're so sweet :)

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Tell me what you think! As always, feedback and reviews are appreciated...happy cooking!