Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

I made these for Thanksgiving and they were such a hit! Seriously, the best I've ever made and the compliments did not stop coming. And they rose really high, it was quite impressive.

For the person who was wondering about freezing/refrigerating, I par-baked mine and they came out great. I baked them just until they started to get a tiny bit of color on top, cooled them completely, then froze them. I thawed them in the fridge overnight, then baked them the rest of the way minutes before dinner. They were perfect!

I've always wondered: is it absolutely necessary to cut out round biscuits with a cutter? Could you not obtain the same results just cutting the dough into squares? That way you don't waste any dough or get those few tough biscuits because of the re-rolled scraps. Thanks!

adbw83: This can absolutely be done by hand, though I would literally do it by hand, rather than with a pastry blender, which I find to be better for pie crusts and such where you want to leave chunks of butter than for biscuits, where you largely want the fat to be finely distributed throughout the flour.

If you are not familiar with cutting butter into flour by hand, I find that it helps to take a few extra precautions: have all the ingredients, even the dry ones, well chilled; run your hands under cold water for a bit and dry them thoroughly before setting about the task at hand; and cut butter and cream cheese into fairly small pieces before starting - this will make the work of cutting them into the dry ingredients much more efficient.

Now, add the butter pieces to the dry ingredients. Then, working quickly with your fingertips, mush the butter into the flour in ever smaller pieces, breaking up larger clumps as you go. Once most of the big chunks are gone, you can rub the mixture lightly between your palms to break down any remaining big stragglers and to acheive a "coarse meal" or "fine couscous" texture.

Add the cream cheese and cut it into the dry ingredients in a similar fashion, but don't blend it in too finely or rub it between your palms. You want the cheese well-distributed, but there should still be a few little pea-sized chunks here and there.

From here, you can just pick up and follow the recipe at step 5.

This biscuit recipe is certainly not difficult to manage solely by hand, but I do so prize the efficiency of my food processor for such jobs.

Oy vey, that should have read "a tablespoon of SUGAR"!!! That's what I get for posting while watching TV!