Buttery, soft, and made completely from scratch, this easy homemade biscuit recipe deserves a permanent place in your recipe repertoire. This recipe is made with all butter, no shortening!
With just 6 ingredients that I bet you already have on hand, these homemade biscuits are so simple to make and I’ve included plenty of tips (and a video!) to make sure you end up with perfect biscuits every single time.
Two reasons I’m super excited to share this homemade biscuit recipe with you today:
One: because homemade biscuits are delicious (obviously) and they’re so easy to make. So many people buy the canned version without realizing that they already have all of the ingredients to make them from scratch in their pantry.
The taste of a pre-made biscuit doesn’t hold a candle to a homemade biscuit. Not. even. close. Preservatives and artificial flavors, you aren’t welcome here.
Two: because ever since I started working on this biscuit recipe a few weeks ago, “Mind Your Own Biscuits” by Kacey Musgraves has been stuck in my head and I’ve been singing it off-key relentlessly.
Don’t get me wrong, I love Kacey Musgraves and her music, but every time I start singing my dog starts actually crying. It’s sad and hilarious, and if I wasn’t so embarrassed by my terrible singing voice I would have shared a video of it by now. Hopefully, by publishing this recipe I’ll release myself from the endless refrain and the animal abuse will finally stop.
But let’s talk more about the first reason.
Homemade biscuits call for just six ingredients: all-purpose flour, baking powder, sugar, salt, butter, and milk. And then more butter once they’re finished baking because of course we need more butter.
I mentioned that these biscuits are easy so do not be alarmed by all the tips that I have for you below. These biscuits are easy, but technique matters and I want to arm you with all the information that you need so that you can make these easily and have them come out perfectly the very first time.
The tips are simple but important, and while some more seasoned bakers already know them, I want to give everyone an even playing field.
Tips for Making Homemade Biscuits
- The butter and milk for this recipe need to be as cold as possible for fluffy and soft biscuits. I freeze my butter before using it and recommend keeping the milk in the refrigerator right up until it’s time to add it to the dry ingredients.
- Don’t overwork the dough! Keep in mind that you want your butter to stay as cold as possible when making these biscuits, and the more you have your hands on the dough the softer the butter will become. Definitely don’t use an electric mixer for this recipe.
- We’re going to do a little bit of laminating. This means folding the dough over itself multiple times (5-6 times here) to encourage flaky layers in our biscuits. You can watch the video below to see exactly how this is done.
- Don’t use a rolling pin, use your hands to gently work the dough into a flat rectangle before cutting out your biscuits.
- Don’t be afraid to add flour to the dough if it’s too sticky while you are handling it (and make sure to work on a lightly floured surface).
Visual clue: If you look at the pre-baked biscuit below, you’ll see that you can actually see the butter pieces in the dough. This is what you want, the ingredients won’t be well-combined like with a cookie dough and seeing bits of butter means you’ve actually done everything right here. Hooray!
A Few Notes on Butter in Homemade Biscuits
The butter is possibly the most important part of this recipe, and the way you handle it can make or break your homemade biscuits.
While you can certainly use a pastry cutter to cut your butter into the dry ingredients, I recommend freezing your butter for about 30 minutes before beginning. Then, use a box grater to grate the butter before combining this in with your dry ingredients.
I use this technique in my scone recipes and highly recommend it with these biscuits, too. Not only is it much easier than using a pastry cutter, but it does a great job of finely shredding and distributing the butter throughout the mixture without overworking the butter (remember, you want to manage the butter as little as possible so that it’s as cold as possible when going into the oven).
Alternatively you could also use a food processor (like I do with my pie crust recipe), but it’s just so easy to grate in the butter that I always use this method instead.
And yes, I do recommend using unsalted butter in this recipe and then adding salt. If you want to know more about why I write my recipes this way, you can read all about it (and an easy substitution if you only have salted butter on hand) in this post that I wrote about salted vs unsalted butter.
I know I’ve mentioned to you guys a few times that I’ve been working on a baking contest/challenge/I’m really not sure what to call it, but I’m planning a post where I encourage all of you to bake along with me. The goal is to get people baking recipes they may have not tried before, and I’m encouraging everyone to share their results for a chance to win a small prize.
Well, today’s homemade biscuit recipe is essentially the base for the baking challenge that I’ll be sharing in exactly one week, so take this as a hint that making today’s recipe is a great way to get a jump start for the challenge!
To make sure you’re among the first to be notified of all new recipes and baking challenges, make sure you’re subscribed to my e-mail list. It’s free, and you get a free e-book of 8 of my favorite cookie recipes.
Enjoy!
How to Make Homemade Biscuits
I know I talked a lot in this video, but I really feel that the tips are so important, and will help ensure your biscuits come out perfectly!
Homemade Biscuits
Ingredients
- 2 cups all-purpose flour (250g)
- 1 Tablespoon baking powder
- 1 Tablespoon granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 6 Tablespoons unsalted butter very cold (85g), unsalted European butter is ideal, but not required
- ¾ cup whole milk¹ (177ml) buttermilk or 2% milk will also work
Recommended Equipment
Instructions
- For best results, chill your butter in the freezer for 10-20 minutes before beginning this recipe. It's ideal that the butter is very cold for light, flaky, buttery biscuits.
- Preheat oven to 425F and line a cookie sheet with nonstick parchment paper. Set aside.
- Combine flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt in a large bowl and mix well. Set aside.2 cups all-purpose flour, 1 Tablespoon baking powder, 1 Tablespoon granulated sugar, 1 teaspoon salt
- Remove your butter from the refrigerator and either cut it into your flour mixture using a pastry cutter or (preferred) use a box grater to shred the butter into small pieces and then add to the flour mixture and stir.6 Tablespoons unsalted butter
- Cut the butter or combine the grated butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.
- Add milk, use a wooden spoon or spatula to stir until combined (don't over-work the dough).¾ cup whole milk¹
- Transfer your biscuit dough to a well-floured surface and use your hands to gently work the dough together. If the dough is too sticky, add flour until it is manageable.
- Once the dough is cohesive, fold in half over itself and use your hands to gently flatten layers together. Rotate the dough 90 degrees and fold in half again, repeating this step 5-6 times but taking care to not overwork the dough.
- Use your hands (do not use a rolling pin) to flatten the dough to 1" thick and lightly dust a 2 ¾" round biscuit cutter with flour.
- Making close cuts, press the biscuit cutter straight down into the dough and drop the biscuit onto your prepared baking sheet.
- Repeat until you have gotten as many biscuits as possible and place less than ½" apart on baking sheet.
- Once you have gotten as many biscuits as possible out of the dough, gently re-work the dough to get out another biscuit or two until you have at least 6 biscuits.
- Bake on 425F for 12 minutes or until tops are beginning to just turn lightly golden brown.
- If desired, brush with melted salted butter immediately after removing from oven. Serve warm and enjoy.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutritional information is based on third-party calculations and should be considered an estimate only. Actual nutritional content will vary based upon brands used, measuring methods, cooking method, portion sizes, and more.
Penny likes to supervise the photography process. Fortunately, this setup got her vote of approval.
Barbara
Hi! These look delicious, so I’m wondering if they freeze well?? I’d love to batch cook and have them ready to just re-heat! Thanks for the recipe and any freezing advice!
Casey @ Sugar Spun Run
Hi Barbara! These biscuits can be frozen, be sure to wrap the biscuits tightly in plastic wrap and store in a freezer bag. 🙂
Barbara
Thank you so much for the speedy reply! I’m looking forward to whipping up a couple of batches!
Melissa
thanks for this recipe! I had soured milk and used for the liquid. flying solo so I halved recipe. turned out great and worthy of the sugar cane syrup I got for Christmas!!
VICTORIA
Total perfection!
Casey @ Sugar Spun Run
We’re so glad you loved it, Victoria! 🙂
Christina Wagner
Love this recipe! My entire family thinks they’re the best! I was curious if we were able to freeze them before cooking or even after and if so, how long? I didn’t see anything about that.
Casey @ Sugar Spun Run
Hi Christina! We’re so glad you love them. You can freeze the biscuits before or after baking. If you freeze before baking, wrap them tightly in plastic wrap and store in a freezer bag and they should store fine for several months. They may just take a minute or two longer in the oven. 🙂
Bill Morgan
I have never made homemade biscuits. Your recipe turned out awesome! Thank you for finally teaching me to make great biscuits.
Casey @ Sugar Spun Run
We’re so glad you enjoyed them, Bill!
Amy Henry
I have made these biscuits countless times and they always turn out so good; thank you for this recipe!! Disclaimer: I do use salted butter and still add the same amount of salt, and they don’t taste overly salty to me. My little hack is a rotary grater for the butter. It takes about 20 seconds to grate a stick of frozen butter with my rotary, then I throw the bowl of grated butter in the freezer while I get the rest of the ingredients ready.
Casey @ Sugar Spun Run
Thank you for sharing your hack, Amy! We’re so glad you enjoy them. ☺️
Nancy Eddy
I use a grater for the cold butter and it incorporates into dry ingredients really nice…a tip a picked up from Tipper at Celebrating Appalachia….😉😊 thanks to you for the biscuit recipe they were really good with Creamed chicken
Casey @ Sugar Spun Run
Hi Nancy! We’re so glad you enjoyed the biscuits! Thank you so much for trying our recipe. ☺️
Debra johnson
These were fantastic. A light and fluffy with a little crips on the edges but so soft on the inside. My family rates this recipe a keeper for sure!
Casey @ Sugar Spun Run
Hi Debra! We’re so glad you and your family love the biscuits! ☺️
Ray McManemin
Excellent and straight forward recipe and takes no time at all prep and bake. Just some other approaches I tried that seemed to work:
1) cut my salt from 1 tsp to 1/2 tsp because I am using salted butter.
2) bake biscuits on a stone and they come out just fine and no sticking issues
3) when first started using this recipe, I didn’t have a biscuit cutter so an upside 1/2 cup did the trick for cutting out the biscuits.
4) Added 1/2 tsp of cinnamon for sweetness (definitely personal taste – not always use this).
Just some ideas. Great recipe and got me off buying store bought versions. Love things I can make from scratch and work every time.
Thanks.
Casey @ Sugar Spun Run
Thanks for sharing all of your tricks, Ray! We’re so glad you enjoy them!
John
I have never made biscuits before.i wanted to make a completely from scratch breakfast for my girlfriend and it turned out beautifully. I will definitely make them again. thank you.
Casey @ Sugar Spun Run
We’re so glad these turned out out so beautifully for you, John! Thanks for trying our recipe 😁
Kelly
First time making biscuits.
Wish I could add a photo they came out perfect!
Casey @ Sugar Spun Run
We’re so glad you enjoyed them, Kelly!
Coral
These are the best buscuits. I thought I’d try a 2 ingredient recipe, just flour and heavy cream. They were good but these are superior. Can I use self rising flour in this?
Casey @ Sugar Spun Run
Hi Coral! We’re so glad you enjoyed the biscuits. We haven’t personally made these with self-rising flour, maybe someone who has can give input?
Angela
We made these for my daughter’s mini pot pies, and they were great.
Casey @ Sugar Spun Run
So glad you enjoyed them, Angela!