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
- Biscuit cutter
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.
- 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.
- 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).
- 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.
Stephanie
Can you add garlic and shredded cheese to these?
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
Hi Stephanie! Yes, others have also added grated cheese and garlic to theirs as well. We also have a garlic cheese drop biscuit recipe that you may also want to try. Those are amazing! 🙂
David
Can I just double the ingredients to make a double batch? Thanks!
Sam
Absolutely! Enjoy, David!
Christine Bowers
I have made these before and I have another batch in the oven right now. This recipe is the best one I’ve tried so far!
Sabre Anderson
So how do you think donuts would turn out with this. I know my family has always used canned biscuits for donuts, but homemade everything is always better!
Sam
Hi Sabre! I haven’t tried it but I think it would probably work well. In fact my fried donut holes are actually made with a similar dough. 🙂
Yasmin
If I need to make a day or so ahead do I freeze ? Or put in fridge? If I do freeze how long do I take out to defrost please ? Thanks heaps
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
Hi Yasmin! These will be great the next day. Of course there is nothing like fresh from the oven, but you can store them in an air tight container and just microwave them for a few seconds before serving to warm them up a bit. 🙂
Laurie
My biscuits look like scones. They are dry and crumbly, but do have a good flavor.
Sam
Hi Laurie! I’m disappointed to hear this. A dry a crumbly biscuit can result from over-baking or over-working the dough, or adding too much flour. 🙁
Dani
Is it Possible too bake these and freeze them when cooled And reheat in a microwave on the day of use ?
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
Hi Dani! That should work just fine. Enjoy! 😊
Shay Jimerson
This is a great recipe! Frozen butter is key, thanks for sharing!
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
Thanks for trusting our recipe, Shay! Enjoy the biscuits 😊
Nandana
Great recipe, even a husband like me can do it.
Only challenge i had was the butter. I liked the idea of grating the butter instead of cutting it to small blocks. Took butter from the freezer. Used the grater box, kinda pain. Used the food processor, came out well, but cleaning was a pain. The grated butter went to the freezer while i got everything else organized.
Came out really well. Didn’t realize that it would become 2x in height, v pleasant surprise. Wish i could attach photos.
Thank you.
Sam
I’m so glad you enjoyed them so much! The cleaning is always the worst part. There’s nothing like a tall flaky biscuit. If you have Instagram you can always post the picture and tag me @Sugarspun_sam or you can join my Facebook group. I love to see pictures. 🙂
Desiree Foster
Can I use salted butter?
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
Hi Desiree! That will work fine, but you’ll just want to reduce your salt by a scant 1/4 teaspoon. 🙂
Michelle
I never comment or review a recipe, just use it and move on.. but these are perfect. So easy and come out so flaky. I think I now have the recipe memorized. 😋
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
We are so happy you loved the biscuits so much, Michelle! Thanks so much for commenting. Enjoy 😊
Chas Massey
Great recipe. My culinary class loved it.
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
We’re so happy to hear that Chas! Let us know if you try anything else. 😊
Kathy Clark
I made these last week and they were delicious!! I want to make them again but can I make them a day or two ahead and store them in the refrigerator until I am ready to bake them?
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
Yes you can! Enjoy, Kathy! 😊
Dana
I’ve made these a couple of times and they come out great, but today I didn’t have the patience to cut the butter into the flour mixture. I threw all the dry ingredients in my food processor and added the butter. Pulsed it a few times and it had cut the butter perfectly into the dry mix. I then added the milk and after a few pulses it was combined but not overworked. You can even save dirtying a bowl by putting the dry ingredients directly into the food processor. I won’t ever do it by hand again!
Sam
I’ve done this myself before (and even developed my scone recipe around this method), great way to save a little time! So glad you enjoyed, Dana!
Janis Williamson
I want to use Almond Flour with this recipe. I know I need to use 25% less Almond Flour and use a binder such as xanthan gum, gar gum or psyllium husk. Can you make an educated guess how mch of one of these products should be used?
Thanks for any help you may offer!
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
Hi Janis! Unfortunately we don’t have experience with these ingredients. 🙁 Hopefully someone who does can chime in.
J Ritt
Maybe look at another site’s recipe for something similar and see their measurements. Then come back here and plug them in to this recipe??? I’ve done this a lot trying to be a little healthier even though it’s painful knowing how delicious recipes are as is!
Susan Vaughn
I love making these they are the go biscuits in our house. We only use 2% milk. What I have done is I add about 1/2 tablespoon of butter. They turn out great. So much so that when we go to see our son at college he asks me to bring him some that I have in the freezer. I love that I wrap them individual so I can make what we need. I try to keep some on hand. But they go fast!!!!
Plus I use sea salt.
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
We’re so happy these biscuits are a hit for you and your family, Susan ❤️ Thanks so much for your five star review!
Alicia
This was my first time making scratch biscuits and wow! They were so easy and the video made it so easy to know exactly what to do. They tasted SO FREAKIN GOOD. I will never go back to store bought biscuit dough again
Emily @ Sugar Spun Run
So easy, right? We’re so happy you liked them, Alicia! Welcome to team “from-scratch” 😊