TWD: Sweet Cream Biscuits

Melissa at Love at First Bite chose this week's TWD recipe, Sweet Cream Biscuits. I really enjoy baking breakfast treats more than anything else. I don't think there is anything better than waking up (or, in my personal situation, waking other people up) to the smell of freshly baked blueberry muffins, or cinnamon scones, or coffee cake. It makes the day seem a little more special, right from the beginning.

These biscuits are simple to whip up, because there is no butter in the recipe, and therefore there is no need to cut butter into the flour. Flour, salt, sugar, baking powder and cream - that's it. I rolled my dough to the 1/2 inch thickness that Dorie recommends, cut them with a 2" cutter, and froze them unbaked.

I know going in that certain baking activities are fraught with danger, so I can do the requisite hand-wringing ahead of time. The sugar may not carmelize. The custard may not thicken. The egg whites may get under whipped. The egg whites may get over whipped. But strangely, I had no idea until I read the P&Q that I should be worrying about whether my biscuits would rise. I suppose that any time I use baking powder I have a fleeting thought that maybe it's lost its magic, but I did not have any specific worry about my biscuits. So I blissfully mixed and cut and froze these just a few days after the April recipes were posted (i.e., well before the P&Q was up) and baked them one Sunday morning while we had friends visiting us from out of town.

And they rose like champs!


Everybody devoured these. They got eaten with, inter alia, butter, bacon, jam, and eggs (not all at the same time) and were universally adored.
Fast forward a couple of weeks, and I learned that I was really lucky that my biscuits rose the first time. Since they were such a hit when I made them, I decided to try them again to see if my success was just a fluke. Usually if there is baking trouble to be had, I will have it, and it felt much more natural for me to head into a recipe with an acute fear of failure. Second go-round I decided to make minis using my 1.5" cutters. And once again, they rose! (See proof at top of post).

One by one my bed-headed kids padded down the stairs and ate biscuits:


I pretty much spent the whole morning spreading butter or jelly on tiny biscuits. They couldn't get enough of them. These are a big hit around here, to put it mildly. I can only hope my biscuit-rising hot streak continues, because these are simple to make, light and flaky, delicious, and hugely popular with my family.

Thanks for the great pick, Melissa!