We all know the song.  Catchy tune.  If you don’t know what song I am referencing then email my husband for a pop culture education.  That is his realm, not mine.  I can’t name but a handful of actors, singers; Dame Judy Dench, Dame Hellen Mirren, Emily Blunt, Meryl Streep, you catch my drift…  I love British films or at least British actors.  Maybe these are proper English tea biscuits but I sincerely doubt it.

Anyway, welcome to my first real attempt at making biscuits.  I’m a prodigy so they turned out perfectly. Actually I am just kidding…about the prodigy thing; I think we all remember the cheese straw incident but the biscuits did turn out perfectly.

I researched a couple different recipes and sort of averaged them out.  I had plenty of flour and shortening so the risk on these was low, except cutting in the shortening which I actually did with two knives. Ree Drummond, The Pioneer Woman http://thepioneerwoman.com/ stated this method would never work for her but it does indeed work. (Someone PLEASE send me a pastry cutter because two knives took forever!!!)

This recipe  made 11 2 inch biscuits.  I wish I had made them larger, but you live, eat and learn.

my usual all ingredient picture

little salt dish we received more than 5 years ago as a wedding gift, I think Alton Brown has the same one

flour leveled off with a knife, you should really weigh flour when baking

whisking all dry ingredients together

about to cut the shortening in to the flour mixture

ha ha, I’m a cut up, or in

after stirring in the milk

I mean REALLY flour the board

 

ready for baking SIR!

fresh out of the oven!

Yummy!

close up to tease you

delicious European butter

going in for the kill

 

you catch more flies with honey…

 

The Recipe

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.

2 cups of all purpose flour

1 T baking powder

1 t salt

1 to 1 1/2 T sugar

1/3 cup vegetable shortening

1 cup milk  * note, I always use whole milk when baking

butter, honey, jam – not required but you are going to want these on hand.  trust me on this one.

1. Sift or whisk together the dry ingredients.

2. Cut in the shortening until you have crumbs the size of small peas, like La Seur baby peas.  I love those….

3. Slowly stir in the milk until the dough comes together.

4. Turn the dough out onto a floured board.  Well floured folks!  This dough does not like to be poked, prodded or otherwise fussed over.

5. Gently form the dough into a disk about 3/4 to an inch thick.

Bake 12-14 minutes or until just golden brown on top.  Eat immediately.  OK, you can wait if you want to but I ate these immediately.

Sorry, I am still learning to type out recipes!

*NOTE – I brushed the flour off the tops because I do that when baking breads, I think it looks and tastes better to not start eating something covered in flour.