These Garlic Cheddar Biscuits are everything you expect them to be. Thick in size, light in texture, crispy shiny tops, crunchy browned bottoms, moist and soft in the center, and full of fragrant garlic and salty cheddar cheese in every bite. That's what I'm talkin'bout! Biscuits that make you want another and another and another...
I decided on a traditional spaghetti with meat sauce dinner last night and wanted a garlic bread to go with the meal. I didn't have any artisan dough in the frig. The only other quick bread I could think to make was biscuits. I knew dinner would only take as long as the pasta needed to cook, 7 minutes. The meat sauce had been made ahead and just needed to be reheated. So, I patty caked as fast I could, rolled'em up, cut'em up, put'em in the pan, popped'em in the oven and set the time for 12 minutes. Went to cooking the pasta and reheating the sauce and dinner was ready when the oven buzzer went off. VOILÁ!
HERE'S ALL IT TAKES
Makes 7 thick biscuits.
- 1/2 cup cold butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon table salt
- 1 cup grated cheddar cheese
- 3/4 cup, plus 2 tablespoons, or 7 ounces buttermilk, plus extra to brush on top of biscuits
HEAT OVEN TO 450ºF.
Using an electric mixer, blend the butter pieces and all the dry ingredients for 1- to 1 1/2- minutes on low speed. Stir in the cheddar cheese, until well distributed. Pour in the buttermilk and mix until the dough comes together to form a ball and all flour is absorbed.
Transfer dough ball to lightly flour work surface. Sprinkle dough ball with enough flour to keep your hands from sticking to it. Knead 5 times to smooth the dough into a ball. Flatten ball out evenly with your hand or a rolling pin until it is 9-inches in diameter. Use a 2-inch biscuit cutter to divide dough. You will need to lightly knead scrap dough and reshape to make remaining biscuits. Transfer into an 8- or 10-inch baking dish or pan.
Generously brush the top of the biscuits with buttermilk. The buttermilk makes the tops shiny and crispy.
BAKE 12 to 14 minutes.
These sound great! There are times I don’t make spaghetti because I don’t have any bread for garlic bread. This solves that problem. I’ll probably just try adding the garlic powder and cheddar to my usual biscuit recipe.
Hi Anna! Spaghetti night without a bread isn’t spaghetti night at all.
If your existing biscuit recipe is already a moist type, than go for it. I’ve tried garlic-cheddar with
the traditional milk and shortening based dough and got dry biscuits that went to the chickens.
The buttermilk and butter make a BIG DIFFERENCE. I promise.
These look great! I was reading through the recipe and I was a little confused. Where does the butter go? I read through it a couple of times and I couldn’t tell where it’s supposed to be added. Also, I don’t have biscuit cutters, is there something else I can use to cut biscuits?
Hey Bridget!
Thanks so much for catching my typo. I’ve corrected the recipe. The butter pieces go
into the mixer bowl with all the dry ingredients.
As for another tool for cutting biscuits, my Aunt Maggie would wet the mouth of a small
plastic cup, dip it in flour, then start cutting. If you don’t mind what shape they are, then use
a serrated knife and cut the dough into 2-inch squares.
I don’t have garlic powder – how much fresh minced garlic would you recommend?
Hi Muggins,
I’m not sure you’re going to get the same effect with the minced garlic, unless you started with garlic infused butter.
If I were in your kitchen, I would let the butter come to room temperature first. Finely mince or better, crush 1 LARGE garlic clove. Stir the garlic into the butter in a small bowl, and cover. Put the butter back in the refrigerator until it’s solid again. Then proceed with the recipe.
Excellent suggestion! Cheers.
hi jill,
finally found some decent buttermilk here in england to try these with, however, my wife and myself both think they are scones not biscuits. that said, they are wonderful. i did spice them up a bit with half a teaspoon of cayenne pepper. i also managed 17 biscuits not 7 and mine were 1 and a half inches thick !
we had some friends over the second time i made these, so we split them put a scrape of butter on and then a slice of salami. it’s worth making a btach just to try this, it’s awesome.