Karl’s Buttermilk Biscuits

I had bought some buttermilk to make cornbread—which takes only one cup of milk—but all the store had for sale was quarts. What could I do with all of the extra buttermilk? Obviously, biscuits for breakfast.

Karl’s Buttermilk Biscuits

Karl’s Buttermilk Biscuits

Ingredients

2 cups flour, AP
1 Tbs. baking powder
1 tsp. kosher salt
1 tsp. sugar

1 stick unsalted butter, frozen
1 cup buttermilk

Directions

1. Sift the flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar several times into a large bowl.

Tip: Repeated sifting helps distribute the ingredients evenly through the mix.

2. Using a box grater, grate the frozen butter into the flour mixture.

Tip: Use a spoon or rubber spatula to stir the butter shreds into the flour occasionally, so that they do not clump together.

Note: Handle the butter with your hands as little as you can, the heat of your hands will melt the butter. This is bad for a fluffy, flaky biscuit.

3. Use a pastry cutter, to break the butter shreds into tiny bits.

Tip: Many recipes have up use a pastry cutter on large lumps of butter. While this eventually works, the heat created by repeated chopping starts to warm the butter. With the frozen butter shreds you only have to chop the butter a few times to get a through mix.

4. Preheat the oven to 425º F.

5. Add most of the buttermilk to the dry ingredients and use a spatula to combine them.

Tip: If necessary, add a bit more buttermilk to make a soft dough.

Note: Buttermilk has more solids in it, so that it actually takes more of it to moisten the flour than regular milk.

6. Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead 10-15 times.

Note: Kneading the dough too much will melt the butter and create too much gluten, giving you a tough, flat biscuit.

7. Roll the dough to one half inch thick and cut the biscuits out with a 2 inch biscuit cutter.

8. Place the biscuits on a baking tray lined with parchment paper and brush the tops with more buttermilk.

9. Bake the biscuits at 425° F, on the middle rack, for 12 minutes or until golden brown.

Tip: Rotate the pan half way through, to ensure that your biscuits bake evenly.