Cream Biscuits

Ainekset

2 cups (10 ounces) unbleached all-purpose flour, plus extra for the work surface

2 teaspoons sugar

1 teaspoon baking powder

½ teaspoon table salt

1½ cups heavy cream

Ohjeet

1. Adjust an oven rack to the upper-middle position and heat the oven to 425 degrees. Line a large rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper. Whisk the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt together in a medium bowl.

2. Add 1¼ cups of the cream to the flour mixture and stir with a wooden spoon until a dough forms, about 30 seconds. Transfer the dough to a lightly floured work surface, leaving all dry, floury bits behind in the bowl. Add the remaining ¼ cup cream, 1 tablespoon at a time, to the bowl, mixing with a wooden spoon after each addition, until all the loose flour is just moistened; add these moistened bits to the dough. Knead the dough briefly just until smooth, about 30 seconds.

3. Pat the dough into a ¾-inch-thick circle or press it into an 8-inch cake pan and turn it out onto a lightly floured surface. Cut the biscuits into rounds using a 2½-inch biscuit cutter or into eight wedges using a knife. Place the rounds or wedges onto the prepared baking sheet and bake until golden brown, about 15 minutes. Serve immediately.

Muistiinpanot

Bake the biscuits immediately after cutting them; letting them stand for any length of time can decrease the leavening power and thereby prevent the biscuits from rising properly in the oven.

Cream Biscuits with Fresh Herbs

Use the herb of your choice in this variation.

Follow the recipe for Cream Biscuits, adding 2 tablespoons minced fresh herbs to the flour mixture in step 1. Proceed as directed.

Cheddar Biscuits

Follow the recipe for Cream Biscuits, adding 2 ounces sharp cheddar cheese, shredded (about ½ cup), to the flour mixture in step 1. Proceed as directed, increasing the baking time to 18 minutes.

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS: With a high rise, light texture, and rich flavor, fresh-from-the-oven biscuits tend to disappear quicker than cookies in the test kitchen. So it’s a shame that many prospective bakers pass them up, just because the recipe calls for the strenuous step of cutting butter into flour, or the messy move of rolling out dough time and again to get every last piece into a round. We wanted to make great biscuits that cut out these extra steps and used a basic combination of heavy cream, flour, baking powder, and salt.

Instead of cutting butter into flour, we included a generous amount of heavy cream in our biscuits, which gave them a lighter and more tender texture. Kneading for just 30 seconds was enough to get our dough smooth and uniform. And we used an extra bit of cream to soak up all the last bits of flour in the bowl. To enhance the light flavor of our biscuits, we added a small amount of sugar. All there was left to do was shape them. Although it is easy enough to pat out this dough and cut it into rounds with a biscuit cutter, we devised a second strategy of simply pressing the dough into an 8-inch cake pan, turning out the dough, and then slicing it into wedges.