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Cook's Illustrated's Best Drop Biscuits

Posted by The Serious Eats Team, November 9, 2007 at 8:00 AM

The following recipe is from Cook's Illustrated's November 2007 issue. The magazine's publisher, Chris Kimball, didn't mention it when he talked to us about the magazine's Thanksgiving coverage, but we love these biscuits so much we asked Kimball for permission to run it here on Serious Eats. You'll find it after the jump.

Best Drop Biscuits

- makes 12 biscuits -

Ingredients

2 cups (10 ounces) unbleached all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon sugar
3/4 teaspoon table salt
1 cup cold buttermilk
8 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly (about 5 minutes), plus 2 tablespoons melted butter for brushing biscuits

Procedure

1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 475°F. Whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, and salt in large bowl. Combine buttermilk and 8 tablespoons melted butter in medium bowl, stirring until butter forms small clumps.

2. Add buttermilk mixture to dry ingredients and stir with rubber spatula until just incorporated and batter pulls away from sides of bowl. Using greased 1/4-cup dry measure, scoop level amount of batter and drop onto parchment-lined rimmed baking sheet (biscuits should measure about 2 1/4 inches in diameter and 1 1/4 inches high). Repeat with remaining batter, spacing biscuits about 1 1/2 inches apart. Bake until tops are golden brown and crisp, 12 to 14 minutes.

3. Brush biscuit tops with remaining 2 tablespoons melted butter. Transfer to wire rack and let cool 5 minutes before serving.

4 Comments | Tags: baking, biscuits, Cook's Illustrated, Thanksgiving