I have made it my personal mission in life to per-fect the biscuit. You can’t even graduate from high school in the South until you demonstrate proficiency at biscuit making—-so I’ve been making biscuits a long time. But I just took the recipe that was passed onto me and never questioned it. You’re not supposed to question a long line of Southern biscuit makers.
But…….
What if I want the lightest fluffiest angel wing biscuits ever to fly over southern skies? What then? Well, I scoured the internet—an a few cookbooks—and made a few dozen biscuits—-using various biscuits methods—and I think we have a winner folks. So, put on an apron, roll up the sleeves on your flannel shirt, put on some bluegrass music and let’s make biscuits.
Now with a pastry blender, cut in 1/4 c. shortening. Or use a whisk if you tend to be hard on pastry blenders.
Now, add 2/3 cups of heavy cream and 1 cup of buttermilk and stir. The mixture will be very wet.
Add 1 cup of flour into a casserole dish or onto your working surface and then with a medium sized ice cream scoop–or whatever sized biscuits you like—scoop a few scoops onto the flour. Flour your hands and then lightly shape the biscuits—adding flour where there really wet—but shaking off any excess flour. They will be coated with flour on the outside, but the inside of each one will still be quite wet.
Spray a round cake pan with cooking spray and then place the biscuits very snugly into the pan. This step is key. These are southern bisuits so they’re invading each other’s personal space and hugging and back-slapping like crazy. If you’re from the Midwest, where personal space is recognized and respected, this step might be hard for you. But trust me, I made my first batch with biscuit-boundaries—and they were flat and boring. Scooch ’em close together and they’ll sing the hallelujah chorus when they’re done.
Then bake at 425 degrees for 18-23 minutes or until they’re golden brown on top. When you take them out of the oven, they look like this—-like they’re happily snuggled under an afghan watching an SEC football game. Then invert them onto a plate–and then turn them right side up onto another plate. Brush them with butter. And that’s when they start singing the hallelujah chorus. Take a knife and cut them apart and notice how some of them are kinda shaped like angel wings.
Butter them generously and enjoy. And then of course, sneak a bite to the dog that has no doubt when lying at your feet while you make them.
I used Darby’s cinnamon butter, which is most wonderfully delicious and easy. I mistakenly added one more stick of butter than she did but it turned out yummy just the same. I used 3 sticks of softened butter, 1 cup honey, 1 cup powdered sugar and 2 t. cinnamon and beat it well in my electric mixer. You can give it away as gifts—-and she has hers decorated up so cute—or if your 7 year old tastes it and begs to keep it all at home, you can do that too!
Y’all enjoy! Get the pdf file for the recipe here.