I’m pretty sure all Southern cooks have their own biscuit recipe – often passed down through generations and made exactly the same way today as they were 50 or 100 years ago. The recipe below is one of those recipes. It’s so simple, and it produces perfect flaky biscuits every time.
I love how biscuits can work any time of the day. For breakfast, they’re amazing smothered in sausage gravy or drenched in honey or jam and butter. At lunch, they make a nice accompaniment to a salad or soup. At dinner, they can be dunked into chili or used to top a chicken pot pie. And for dessert, of course, there’s biscuit-based strawberry shortcake.
Southern Buttermilk Biscuits
12 biscuits
15 minutes
15 minutes
30 minutes
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons granulated sugar
1 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons cold, unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
3/4 cup cold buttermilk, plus additional for brushing
Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F.
In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar and salt.
Cut in the butter, either using a pastry cutter or two knives or in a food processor, until the butter is in clumps the size of peas.
Add the buttermilk and work the dough just until it comes together in a ball.
Transfer the dough to a lightly floured board and knead it gently a few times before patting it into a rectangle.
Fold it in thirds like a letter, flatten it out into a 1/2-inch-thick rectangle again, and repeat folding and flattening once or twice more. Finish by patting it to 1/2-inch thick.
Using a 2-1/2-inch round biscuit cutter, cut out 12 biscuits. Arrange the rounds on the baking sheet and brush a bit of buttermilk over the their tops.
Bake in the oven for about 15 minutes, until they are puffed and golden brown.
Remove from the oven and serve warm.