Garlic Cheddar Biscuits

Yes it is going to be the hottest day of the year according to meteorologists. And yes I made a cake, biscuits, and lemon curd this morning. But I did it before it got really hot and I used a box fan to blow all of the hot air out of the kitchen.

I made some herbed biscuits the other day and realized they are are really easy and require very few ingredients. I am going to a BBQ tonight so I made these little savory bite-sized guys to bring along with my blueberry cake, which I still have to assemble and ice.

In between all of the baking and cooking (I'm making a salad too but thankfully there's nothing to cook there) I am lounging in Jenn's blow-up baby pool. Pool party at Jenn's!!

This recipe comes from Zoom Yummy. I used buttermilk instead of regular milk and added in about 1/2 cup of parmesan cheese and sprinkled some on top for fun. I accidentally put in 1/2 teaspoon of garlic when the recipe called for 1/2 tablespoon- that's what you get for not reading carefully.

Ingredients:

1 cup ap flour
1 1/2 tsp sugar
2 tsp b powder
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp garlic powder

1 stick cold butter- cut in pieces

1/2 cup buttermilk
1 cup cheddar cheese
1/2 cup parmesan cheese, plus more for sprinkling

Method:

Preheat oven to 400, spray mini muffin pans and set aside.
Combine all dry ingredients, set aside.
Chop butter in small pieces and cut into dry ingredients with pastry cutter until the butter is incorporated into the flour in small pea-sized pieces.
Add buttermilk and cheeses and mix with spatula until dough ball forms.
Work quickly and don't touch the dough too much with your hands or you'll melt the butter.
Turn the dough ball out onto your floured counter and roll into a log with your hands- work quickly.
Cut the dough into walnut -sized pieces and then roll each one in a ball with your hand and place directly into the sprayed muffin tin.
I used 1 1/4 muffin tins.
Sprinkle the tops with some parmesan if you like and bake for about 20 mins.
Mine didn't get as brown as the ones in the picture of the original recipe but I didn't want them to get dry so I took them out.

Black Pepper and Herb Biscuits

Why did I feel like making biscuits? Well I've never made them before so I thought I'd give it a shot. I ran out of buttermilk so I used a combo of 2% milk and heavy cream and I added fresh rosemary, chives, and thyme from my garden. Because I didn't use the right milk my biscuits were a little runny and after I formed them they baked together as one big cake biscuit, I just cut them apart once they cooled.

This recipe comes from Ode To Goodness. The directions are really easy to understand and are basically the same way you make scones.

Ingredients:

8 tablespoons (1 stick) cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/4 inch cubes

3 cups all purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 tablespoon ground pepper
handful of fresh herbs

1 1/2 cups cold buttermilk

Method:

With a rack in the middle of the oven, heat to 500 degrees. Spray a 9 inch cake pan with non-stick spray. Set aside. Also, grab a 1/4 cup measure and spray it inside and out with non-stick spray, you’ll use it to portion out the biscuits and that will help the dough to slip out easily.
Spread one cup of flour onto a rimmed baking sheet to toss the biscuits in later. Set aside.
Mix the remaining two cups of flour, baking powder, sugar, salt, pepper, and herbs in a bowl to combine. Add the butter and cut it in with 2 forks until the mixture resembles coarse meal. Add the buttermilk and mix lightly with a rubber spatula until the mixture is just combined. Do not over mix. It should be a little lumpy.
Working quickly, measure out a leveled 1/4 cup of the dough in your greased measuring cup. Drop the biscuits onto the floured rim baking sheet. Continue until you have no more dough. Sprinkle some flour from the baking sheet on top of each biscuit. Roll the biscuit in the flour, pick it up and form into a ball by passing it from each had to the other, kind of like your playing hot potato (remember that game?). By doing so, you’ll shape it and get rid of excess flour. Place the dough into the cake pan, arranging 9 biscuits around the perimeter and then filling in the middle with the last three.
Bake the biscuits for 5 minutes, then reduce the oven temperature to 450 and bake for another 15 minutes, or until nice and golden brown. Cool the biscuits in the pan for two minutes then flip them out onto a clean kitchen towel, then flip them right side up. Break them apart and let cool for 5 more minutes.

Chocolate Chip Anzac Biscuits

Have you ever heard of Anzac Biscuits? I started seeing recipes for them on taste spotting a few months ago and I loved their golden color. As usual I was sold by the awesome cookie photos. Apparently they are an Australian cookie that used to be made very thick and hardy and they kept well, for this reason soldiers took them to eat during war time.

This recipe comes from Whisks and Whimsy. The only changes that I made were to use honey instead of golden syrup and I added chocolate chips. I baked my cookies in a little longer to get the desired brown-ness, they really can't get over cooked because they're supposed to be really crispy.

Ingredients:

1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
1 cup desiccated coconut or unsweetened finely shredded coconut
1/4 teaspoon fine grain sea salt

1 cup sugar
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
1 tablespoon honey

2 tablespoons boiling water
1 teaspoon baking soda

1 cup chocolate chips

Method:

Preheat oven to 350.
Mix flour, oats, coconut, and salt in bowl and set aside.
Mix boiled water and b soda in small bowl and set aside.
In the bowl of an electric mixer cream the butter and sugar.
Add honey and mix to combine.
Add b soda/water mixture to bowl and mix just til combined.
Add dry ingredients and mix til combined.
Add chocolate chips and mix in.

Drop tablespoon sized balls on cookie sheet, I pushed mine down to be little discs, they don't have to be really far apart because the cookies don't spread as much as regular chocolate chip ones do.
Bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until cookies have achieved desired brown-ness. I let mine get pretty good and brown.
Let them cool on the sheet, they are really soft when you pull them out of the oven, but they harden on the sheet so don't start picking at them until the coconut really hardens up- about 15 mins.