Tips For Making The Perfect Buttermilk Biscuits

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Title: Tips For Making The Perfect Buttermilk Biscuits
Categories: breads, breakfast
Yield: 1 servings

1 good recipe for biscuits
1 light touch with dough

THE PERFECT BUTTERMILK BISCUIT Thanks to Eula Mae Dore, a great
Southern cook from Avery Plantation, La., I've learned to make the
best Buttermilk Biscuits I've ever had. Eula Mae says a good biscuit
is one of the best things to have on hand for quick meals. She uses
them in emergencies to make simple sandwiches filled with scraps of
ham or cheese and serves them with pickles and a small salad. For
dessert, she warms a biscuit or two and makes a shortcake with fresh
fruits or berries. She has convinced me that you can't have too many
biscuits on hand. Eula Mae learned to cook and bake from her
grandmother, not from cookbooks, and the artfulness of her
preparation was a joy to watch. Here are some of her biscuit-making
tips: + First go out and replace your baking powder, unless you
bought it within the last four months. More baking flops occur from
old, tired baking powder than from any other cause. And don't rely on
the old test of checking the freshness of baking powder by putting a
spoonful in a glass of water to see if it fizzes. Baking powder, like
a carbonated drink, can fizz a little and still be almost flat.
Buying new baking powder costs very little when you consider the cost
of baking failures. + Next, Eula Mae insists that sifting the dry
ingredients four times is the reason her biscuits are perfect. I
tested the recipe sifting and not sifting and, indeed, sifting does
make a slightly higher, more tender biscuit. + After you cut the
biscuit dough, put the pieces on a baking sheet upside down. This
ensures a taller, lighter biscuit by making sure any edges crimped by
the pressure of the cutting don't interfere with the rise. (The
French use the same trick when making puff pastry.) + The tip that
helped me the most was using less flour than usual. Eula Mae's dough
was soft and sticky. She handled it gently, dusting her hands and the
dough with only enough flour to make the dough manageable. The result
was a lighter biscuit.


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