Most People Make Biscuits Wrong! Try These Old Southern Tricks for Tall, Fluffy Biscuits

Most biscuits come out flat, dry and heavy, and every reason why costs nothing to fix. Meemaw Ruby Mae has been making Southern buttermilk biscuits in her eastern Kentucky kitchen since she was seven, the way her mother made a pan every morning from 1946 to 1989. These are the 7 old Southern tricks for tall, fluffy biscuits that pull apart in soft layers: the right flour, cold fat, wet dough, a light hand, a straight cutter, a crowded pan and a hot oven. Along the way she tells how Kentucky cooks made beaten biscuits before baking powder, how cathead biscuits got their name, and where sawmill gravy came from. MEEMAW'S BUTTERMILK BISCUITS (makes about 8 to 10) 2 cups soft wheat flour or all-purpose flour, spooned into the cup and leveled 1 tablespoon baking powder ½ teaspoon baking soda 1 teaspoon salt ½ cup cold lard or butter (or half of each) About ¾ cup cold buttermilk Melted butter for the tops 1. Heat the oven to 450°F (230°C) and let it heat all the way through. 2. Stir the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt together. 3. Rub in the cold fat with your fingertips until the biggest pieces are the size of a pea. 4. Stir in the buttermilk until the dough is shaggy and a little sticky. 5. Pat the dough out about an inch thick, fold it in thirds like a letter, and do it three times. Then pat it out ¾ inch thick. 6. Cut straight down with no twist. Set the biscuits touching in a cast iron skillet or round cake pan. 7. Brush the tops with melted butter and bake 12 to 15 minutes, until golden. Using self-rising flour? Leave out the baking powder and salt. Tell me in the comments what your family put on a hot biscuit. Butter and sorghum, sausage gravy, or something else? Subscribe for more of the old Southern ways Meemaw's mother taught her. Next up: sausage gravy from three things in your kitchen.