Lock Down Flavor with These Biscuits

I feel like blessing the world with a recipe.

Today I got up and saw how great the weather was, and I thought about all the things God does for me, and I decided to make biscuits.

I think no explanation is needed.

I didn’t have buttermilk. I decided to play around with what I had. I made 7 biscuits around 2″ in diameter. You can scale the recipe up. It’s big enough for two reasonable people.

INGREDIENTS

1 cup biscuit flour
2/3 cup milk
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. sugar
1 tsp. salt
1 tbsp. cold butter
1 tbsp. cold bacon grease
1/4 tsp. citric acid – I am guessing here. You might start with 1/8 tsp.

Naturally, I had citric acid in my kitchen. This is me we’re talking about. I didn’t have buttermilk, but citric acid is sour, so I used it.

You mix the dry stuff and then cut in the fat. Make sure it doesn’t melt. Mix in the milk, holding some back so you can sneak up on the right amount without making the dough too wet. Roll and fold the dough 4 times, using flour to keep it from sticking to things. I roll the dough out to about 5/8″ high before cutting the biscuits.

Put the biscuits next to each other on the pan, grease the tops, and bake at 450.

I don’t trust Alton Brown, for very good reasons, but he can’t always be wrong, and says to put biscuits close to each other to make them rise higher. I don’t know if it worked, but it didn’t hurt.

I was concerned that the citric acid might make the biscuits heavy or tough, because citric acid is an emulsifier, but they were fine. Very nice. The hint of acidity made the biscuits much better than usual. I think I shouldn’t bother buying buttermilk any more. Citric acid gives me better results. Maybe I could use buttermilk and a smaller dose of acid.

I ate the biscuits with gravy made with country ham fat and bacon grease.

These were tremendous. I’m glad I only made 7.

UPDATE

I made the biscuits again. I believe you need a good solid 1/4 teaspoon of citric acid per cup of flour.