Flaky Baking Powder Biscuits Scones Food

BEST EVER CLASSIC SCONES

Steps:

• Preheat your oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit and prepare a baking sheet or two (depending on how large your baking sheets are) by lining them with parchment paper. Set aside.
• In a large bowl combine the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Mix well with a fork or a whisk.
• In a liquid measuring cup, measure the cream and add the eggs. Whisk together using a fork and set aside.
• The next few steps should be done quickly, as you're working with cold butter and you want the butter to be as cold as possible when it hits the heat of the oven. This will result in a flaky scone, rather than a heavy and dense one.
• Cut up your butter, right from the fridge, into little pieces and dump it into the flour mixture. Using your hands (wash them well first and remove any rings), pick up handfuls of the butter and flour mixture, rubbing the pieces of butter and the flour between the heels of your hands to create "sheets" of butter. You should act quickly here, and don't allow the pieces of butter to sit in your hands for any length of time as the heat from your hands will cause it to soften. The goal is to create paper-thin pieces of butter, small and large throughout the mixture. Once there are no thick chunks of butter remaining, only thin sheets, remove your hands from the mixture. Hands equal heat, so handle the mixture as little as possible.
• Pour in the wet ingredients and mix roughly with a fork. Do not over mix, or the result will be heavy and dense.
• Once the wet ingredients have been incorporated but there are still several streaks of flour, turn the dough out onto a clean and floured counter surface. Press the dough down into the counter and then fold one half over the other half like you are folding a piece of paper. Press down again and make another fold. Repeat this 2 or 3 more times, gathering any outlying dough bits and flour into your folds. Don't knead the dough like you would if you were making bread, and don't stir or mix the dough like you would if you were making muffins. Scones are technically a pastry, so the goal is flaky layers that are created by the thin sheets of butter and all the folding.
• Once your dough is formed after folding several times, shape it into a rectangle about 1 3/4 to 2 inches thick (approximately). Again, be careful not to handle the dough too much, so a few little cracks here and there are fine.
• Cut out circles of dough using a biscuit cutter or the rim of a class or jar. Arrange the circles of dough on the parchment-lined baking sheet and brush the tops with the egg wash (whisk together the egg and water).
• You'll need to re-shape the leftover dough to form another rectangle - do this carefully and gently, without adding much extra flour if possible. The less you handle the dough, the more tender and flaky the scones will be. Cut out the remainder of the scones until you have about 10-12 in total.
• Bake for about 15-18 minutes just until barely golden brown and the surface of the scones lose their shine. Let them cool for 3-5 minutes on the baking sheet. Transfer them to a cooling rack to cool completely.

FLAKY BAKING POWDER BISCUITS (SCONES)

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 425°F (220°C).
• Sift flour, sugar, baking powder and salt together.
• Cut in shortening with pastry cutter or two knives (or just rub in with fingers)until it resembles a course meal.
• Combine egg and milk.
• Add this to the flour mixture all at once, stirring just enough with fork to make a soft dough that sticks together.
• Knead lightly 15 times on a lightly floured surface.
• Roll to 3/4" (2cm) thickness and cut with 2" (5cm) cutter, placing 1" (2.5cm) apart on ungreased baking sheet.
• Bake for 12 minutes or until golden brown.
• Serve immediately.

FLAKY BISCUITS

Steps:

• In large bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, sugar and salt. Using pastry blender, 2 knives or fingertips, cut in butter and shortening until coarse crumbs with a few larger pieces. Make well in centre; pour in milk all at once. Stir with fork just until dough clings together.
• Turn out onto lightly floured surface; knead lightly 10 to 12 times. Pat out into scant ¾ inch thickness. Using 2 ½ inch round cutter, cut out biscuit, dipping cutter in flour between cuts, making sure to cut straight down and not twisting the cutter, which would seal the edges and prevent them from rising fully. Repeat with scraps once.
• Bake on ungreased or parchment paper-lined baking sheet in 450 degree oven until risen, golden and flaky, about 12 minutes.

BAKING POWDER BISCUITS

Steps:

• Preheat the oven to 450.
• Grease on 8-inch square baking pan or small baking sheet.
• Put the flour, baking powder and salt into a large mixing bowl. Add the vegetable shortening and toss it to coat with the flour. Break the chunk into 5 or 6 smaller chunks and start rubbing the flour and shortening together with your fingers and letting the mixture fall back into the bowl. This does not take long; when the mixture looks like irregular lumps you have mixed enough.
• Add the milk all at once and stir to moisten all the flour and shortening. Dust a surface with flour, turn the dough onto the surface and knead the dough ten times.
• Pat the dough into a circle about 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch thick. Cut the biscuits with a two-inch cookie cutter and place on the prepared pan with a little space between the biscuits.
• Bake 15-18 minutes or until the tops are lightly browned.
• Serve hot with butter and honey.

FLAKY LAYER BISCUITS

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 400.
• Sift together dry ingredients into a large bowl.
• Grate butter into dry ingredients and combine in 2 or 3 batches.
• Add buttermilk and mix until mixture is all crumbles. Hand knead/fold until all remaining dry ingredients are combined into a single ball.
• Turn out dough ball onto a floured surface and roll out into a rectangle approximately 1/2" thick. Fold thirds , rotate 1/4 turn and repeat until dough has been rolled and folded 5 - 7 times. Roll out final time 1/2" and cut biscuits.
• Place on baking tray (optionally, brush top of biscuits with melted butter) and put in oven for 15 - 18 minutes until golden brown on top.

FLAKY BISCUITS

Steps:

• Place a rack in the center of your oven, Pre heat oven to 450 degrees F.
• Mix first dry ingredients in a large bowl or in the food processor fitted with steel blade.
• Add cold butter and shortening; with your fingertips or a pastry blender (or in the food processor), mix or process butter and shortening into dry ingredients, until the mixture resembles dry oatmeal.
• If using a food processor, transfer mixture to a large bowl.
• Stir in milk with a rubber spatula or fork until dry ingredients are just moistened.
• Let dough rest for 1 minute, then dump it on a floured work surface.
• Gently Roll the dough into a rough 6-by-10-inch rectangle 1/2-inch thick.
• With a knife cut rectangle three times across and five times down to form 15, 2"x2" rectangular biscuits.
• Place dough 1 1/2 inches apart on an ungreased baking sheet; brush dough tops with melted butter or milk.
• Bake until biscuits are lightly browned, 10 to 12 minutes.
• Serve immediately.
• Cool left overs, wrap with plastic wrap and freeze as soon as possible.
• NOTE.
• There's two things to remember when making biscuits.
• -Keepthings cold so the butter does not melt.
• The process of cutting the butter into the flour actually coats the flour with a light layer of grease to prevent it from absorbing liquid and creating gluten-- which will make the product tough and more bread like.
• If the butter starts to get soft while working it into the flour then refrigerate the batch for 20 mins before going on.
• -Workfast and gently.
• Only mix as much as necessary to do the job.
• Over working dough develops gluten.