Cook\'s Country - 2019-06-07

18 COOK’S COUNTRY • JUNE/JULY 2019

Biscuits belong at every

meal. So they need

to be easy. by Cecelia Jenkins

I DEFY YOU to corral the range of
the humble biscuit. Biscuits are as wel-
come at breakfast as they are at lunch.
They’re a treat at dinner, and make a
rib-sticking afternoon snack. And they
take a thousand forms: square, round,
large, small, stamped, dropped, flaky,
fluffy, cheesy, and so on.
But in my mind, because they are
so versatile, biscuits are the kind of
thing you want to know how to make by
hand—and by heart. I was determined
to create a simple buttermilk biscuit
recipe with a no-brainer method that
yielded buttery biscuits with soft, fluffy
interiors and tangy buttermilk flavor.
Biscuit making usually starts with

breaking up bits of cold butter into

flour. You then add liquid and form

biscuits from the resulting dough. In the

oven, the cold bits of butter melt and

produce steam, creating a fluffy interior.

Rather than breaking out the food

processor to get my dough to the right

consistency, I chose to use my hands—

the best tool in the kitchen—for this

important task.

I dropped ½-inch pieces of cold

butter into my dry ingredients (flour,

salt, and leavener) and then pinched

the pieces between my fingers to break

them into pea-size, flour-coated chunks

(larger pieces left craters in the biscuits).

I stirred in buttermilk, dumped the

shaggy dough out onto a heavily floured

counter, and rolled it to an even thick-

ness, adding flour as needed to combat

stickiness. I stamped out the biscuits

with a round cutter, nestled them into

a baking pan, and baked. The biscuits

were tasty, but they weren’t as tall as I’d

hoped. Worse, I was left with a messy

counter and lots of dough scraps.

To eliminate scraps, I decided to

make square biscuits (no stamping).

For a taller result, I would tightly fill

an 8-inch square baking pan using all

the dough and crowding the biscuits to

encourage them to bake upward, not

outward. I cut my next batch of dough

into squares and squished them into the

pan. I was happy to see them bake up

fluffy and tall, and each one pulled apart

nicely from the group. But I still had an

annoying mess of flour on my counter.

That’s when a colleague offered a

simple yet extraordinary suggestion:

Skip the counter and just dump the

dough from the bowl directly into the

pan. Talk about an aha moment!

This method was a breeze and

eliminated the mess. After patting the

dough evenly into the pan, I made a

few swift cuts with my bench scraper

to create nine squares (two cuts in

each direction—think tic-tac-toe) and

then slid the pan into the oven. Thirty

minutes later, I had golden-topped,

tangy biscuits with snow-white, fluffy

insides —and they were a whopping

3 inches tall.

A few details: I chose cake flour

for extra fluffiness, though heavier

all-purpose flour is an acceptable sub-

stitute. I used a combination of baking

powder and baking soda for the most

impressive height and least chance of

off-flavors (too much baking powder

can taste tinny). When pinching the

butter into the flour, I found that it

was best to move fast and not mush too

aggressively; the heat from fingers can

compromise the result.

Now, when I need biscuits, my hands

know the way. After one round with

these beauties, yours will, too.

Light but rich.

Tall and fluffy.

Buttery. And easy.

Pat in the Pan

Buttermilk Biscuits