Wednesday: 2-Ingredient Biscuits
When I saw the title of this recipe during my search for a biscuit recipe--a-HEM-- which I first did a month ago when I made these--, I thought, "yeah: Bisquick and water, right?" But this is the real deal. At the very maximum, you'll have to do it with four ingredients. And that ain't half bad. Incidentally, when I say "biscuits," I'm talking about the American variety, which are kind of like scones...but not entirely.
The Recipe
INGREDIENTS
2 cups / 250 g self-rising flour
- 1 cup / 235 ml heavy cream
DIRECTIONS
Put the dry ingredient(s) in a large bowl. If you're adding salt and baking powder (see the note below), then mix them in well.
Add the cream. I find that a wooden spoon is the best way to start out with the mixing. Once the mixture is more solid, I use my hands. Mix just until combined
Scrape out onto a clean, floured surface and knead together no more than five times.
Roll them to about 1/2" thickness and cut them into 3" circles. Or just make little balls with your hands and smash them down with the bottom of a glass until they're 1/2" thick and about 3" across. Metric: 3" ≈ 7.6 cm ; 1/2" ≈ 1.25 cm
Place on a greased baking sheet.
Bake: 450°F / 232° C ; 8-10 minutes.
The Notes
If you can't find self-rising flour just measure out all-purpose flour and add 1tsp salt and 1 tablespoon baking powder.
If you have experience working with dough, it helps. If the dough is really sticking to your hands, it's too wet. work a little flour into it. If you've got things incorporated and they're still crumbly, add a bit more cream.
Try to mix the ingredients but don't knead them too much. Doing so builds up the gluten in the flour, which will make your biscuits heavy and dense. Nay, you're trying for light and flaky.
- If they get hard before you can finish eating them all, simply wrap them in a dishtowel /tea towel and toss in your microwave for 15-30 seconds.
- Biscuits are generally consumed with jam and butter, but in the American South, it's fairly common to slather them with sausage-laden white gravy. Some people eat them with honey. Finally, you can make little breakfast sandwiches by filling them with egg, cheese, bacon, sausage, whatever.
The Resources
Wikibooks Cookbook + Wikipedia
Together, these are great resources for learning about food all over the world. The encyclopedia has Latin names for plants (which you can use to do things like discover that acorn squash is one of the vegetables that Japanese people call kabocha). The cookbook has a nice variety of recipes.
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