Mrs. Goodall's Buttermilk Biscuits - Southern

By Addie

"This recipe comes from "Baking" by Dorie Greenspan, a fabulous book. I have been doing a lot of research on flour and for biscuits the consensus is use White Lily flour. Unfortunately, it's not easy to find in the PNW, so here is a great compromise, cake and unbleached flour. Dorie also suggests using you hands to quickly incorporate the butter into the flour, the butter should end up coated and NOT uniform in size. The dough can be made, wrapped air-tight and frozen for up to 2 months. If you like a crisper edge, do not let the baking biscuits touch. If you like a softer edge on the biscuit, place the biscuits on the baking tray touching each other."

Ingredients

• 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/3 cup cake flour
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, 3/4 stick, cold and cut into 12 pieces
• 3/4 cup buttermilk

Preparation

Step 1

Preheat oven to 425°. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone mat.

Whisk the flours, baking powder, baking soda, sugar and salt in a large mixing bowl.

Drop in butter and using your fingers, toss to coat the pieces with flour and cut and rub the butter into the flour mixture until it is pebbly with different sized pieces from very small to pea-size.

Pour the buttermilk over the dry ingredients and toss gently with a fork and turn the ingredients until you have a nice soft dough.

In the bowl, give the dough 3- 4 kneads to bring the dough together.

Lightly dust a work surface with flour and turn out the dough.

Dust the top of the dough very lightly with flour and quickly pat the dough with your hands until it is about 1/2-inch high.

Use a biscuit cutter to cut as many biscuits as you can. Re-roll remaining dough and cut more biscuits until dough is used up.

Place biscuits on baking sheet. Bake the biscuits for 14- 18 minutes or until puffed and golden brown.
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REVIEWS:

Wow, these were really good! I haven't had biscuits that good since my friends mom made biscuits and gravy for us 20 years ago. Much better than the typical restaurant fare. I'll be making these again! I had to use milk lemon juice and a touch of vinegar instead of buttermilk, but they still turned out great. The combination of flours seemed to help give it that tender, fluffy texture I love. Even with substitute buttermilk, the butter came through with lots of flavor. I'll be making these again!

This is a great recipe! Simple! I made the dough in about 5 min. used the cake flour to pat out and cut and then put most in the freezer and baked some to see the finished product. Made the frozen ones to take in the motorhome so we have fresh homemade biscuits with fresh/frozen homemade gravy......ewwlala!

I made these biscuits last night and have to admit these are the BEST! I have ever made. Super fluffy and I love the idea (which I never knew before) to place them close together in a pan to have soft edges. I had never used cake flour before either. This is now my #1 favorite all time biscuit recipe, and could easily be the top rated. I think the unsalted butter and buttermilk are KEY