Homemade Biscuits Recipe

By The Cooking World, Editorial Staff

July 8, 2022

Molly's Homemade Biscuits Recipe

In this week's We Cook Books recipe, we shared Molly's Homemade Biscuits Recipe from Turkey and the Wolf cookbook.

These are one of the best biscuits we've ever tried. This recipe calls for frozen grated butter, which creates little pockets of steam in the oven and clinches a real tender crumb. The use of buttermilk and sour cream gives these biscuits a richness and tanginess that is impossible to resist.

PREP TIME

15 minutes

COOK TIME

20 minutes

serves

Ingredients

180 g (1½ sticks) unsalted butter, frozen
375 g (1½ cups) buttermilk
170 g (½ cup plus 2 tablespoons) sour cream
480 g (4 cups all-purpose flour), plus more for rolling
37 g (2 tablespoons plus 2¾ teaspoons) baking powder
30 g (2 tablespoons) kosher salt
15 g (1 tablespoon) white sugar
6 g (1½ teaspoons) citric acid
1 egg
15 g (1 tablespoon) heavy cream or whole milk
Flaky sea salt (optional)

Special Equipment

Large Baking Sheet
Box Grater
Medium Bowl
Large Bowl
Flexible Spatula
Rolling Pin
Bench Scraper
Measuring Spoons
Measuring Cups‍
Digital Scale

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Instructions

Get your oven to 200 ºC (400°F). Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper (or lightly coat the baking sheet with nonstick spray).
Use the large holes of a box grater to grate the frozen butter into a bowl, then put it back in the fréezer. In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together the buttermilk and sour cream and set aside in the fridge. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, kosher salt, sugar, and citric acid.
Now, you want to make the dough without warming the butter too much. So get ready - speed is important from here on. Add the grated butter to the flour mixture and toss well with your hands, breaking up any big clumps of butter but not doing the usual "working in the butter" business. Instead, you're basically just coating the butter bits in the dry stuff.
Next, pour in the buttermilk mixture and use a flexible spatula to mix everything together in about eight big swooping folds. You're trying to get all of the dry mixture wet without working it too much (that'd give you chewy biscuits). Then, use your hands to quickly finish the dough, giving it a couple of folds in the bowl and incorporating any wet or dusty spots.
Dust the counter with about 34 g (¼ cup) all-purpose flour. Give yourself a good 60 by 30 centimeters (2 feet by 1 foot) of space for the biscuits, even though you're not going to roll them that big. Dump the dough onto the floured surface and dust the top of the dough blob with another 2 tablespoons or so flour. Pat the dough blob into a rough 15 cm (6-inch) square that's about 5 cm (2 inches) high.
Using a rolling pin and working from the middle out, roll out the dough to a nice even 25 cm (10-inch) square. Use your hands to brush off any excess flour.
Fold one of the sides about a third of the way over the dough, then fold the opposite side over the folded dough. Rotate the dough a quarter turn clockwise (or at least the same direction each time) and roll out the dough to make that nice even square again. Repeat this process (fold like a letter, quarter turn, and roll it out) three more times, for a total of four folds, but on the last time, stop before you roll it into the 25 cm (10-inch) square. If your square begins to look wonky, take a moment to pat the dough into a neater rectangle between those quarter turns.
After the fourth fold, roll out the dough once more, but this time make a rectangle measuring about 18 by 25 cm (7 by 10 inches). Trim the edges with a bench scraper or knife - a straight edge makes the biscuits rise better. Cut the dough into twelve 5 to 6 cm (2- to 2½-inch) squares and put them on the baking sheet with a good 5 cm (2 inches) between each one.
In a small bowl, whisk together the egg and heavy cream until there are no blobs of egg whites. Brush or rub the biscuit tops with a thin layer of this egg business, then lightly sprinkle with flaky sea salt.
Bake on the center rack, rotating the pan halfway through, until the undersides are fully golden brown and a toothpick poked in the center comes out nice and dry, 20 minutes or so.
Serve the biscuits warm.