Homemade biscuits are fluffy and delicious and while perfect for the holidays, are great for any time of the year. This flaky biscuit recipe only has 5 ingredients and comes together quickly, getting them on the table in about half an hour.
Why we love this recipe
If you need a very quick biscuit recipe, this is truly perfect. These biscuits bake up beautifully, are nice and flakey, have plenty of rise, and you only need 5 ingredients.
Biscuits are a common comfort food available on holiday tables around the country. You can have them for breakfast smeared with butter and jam, or serve them with another favorite, Biscuits and Gravy.
Ingredients you will need to make homemade biscuits
There’s only one wet ingredient, heavy cream. For this recipe you don’t need butter as well as milk because even though biscuit recipes need a fat, heavy cream provides all that you need.
- Dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, sugar, salt
- Wet ingredient: heavy cream
How to make Homemade Biscuits
These step by step photos and instructions are here to help you visualize how to make this recipe. Please scroll down to simply print out the instructions!
Start by preheating the oven to 425 degrees F. Line your baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat.
- Whisk together the flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt in a medium bowl.
- Pour about 1 cup of the cream over the dry ingredients. Using a fork and start tossing the ingredients together. If needed, add more cream, a spoonful at a time, until you have a nice soft dough.
- Reach into the bowl with your hands and give the dough a quick, gentle kneading – 3 or 4 turns should be just enough to bring everything together.
- Lightly dust a work surface with flour and turn out the dough. Dust the top of the dough very lightly with flour and pat the dough out with your hands or roll it with a pin until it is about 1/2 inch thick. Don’t worry if the dough isn’t completely even – a quick, light touch is more important than accuracy.
- Use a biscuit cutter to cut out as many biscuits as you can. Try to cut the biscuits close to one another so you get the most you can out of this first round.
- By hand or with a small spatula, transfer the biscuits to the baking sheet.
- Gather together the scraps, working them as little as possible, pat out to a 1/2-inch thickness and cut as many additional biscuits as you can; transfer these to the sheet.
- Bake the biscuits for 14 to 18 minutes, or until they are tall, puffed and golden brown. Transfer them to a serving basket.
Baking Tips
- Be careful not to overwork the dough or it can become tough.
- Freezing: The biscuits can be made to the point right before baking and frozen on the baking sheet. When frozen, wrap them airtight and they can be kept in the freezer for up to 2 months. Bake without defrosting – just add a couple more minutes to the oven time.
- Serving: Ideally these biscuits should go from oven to table and be served with cold sweet butter.
- Storing: You can keep the biscuits in a plastic bag overnight and give them a quick warm-up in the oven the next day, but you won’t recapture their freshly made flakiness.
What to serve homemade biscuits alongside
- Crockpot Beef Stew is one of my favorite cold weather recipes. Dipping a biscuit into the gravy is pure bliss.
- While I really love homemade sweet cornbread with a bowl of chili, biscuits are amazing too.
- Another stew favorite that homemade biscuits go well with is my Dutch Oven Goulash.
- Two favorite slow cooker beef recipes that these go with are my Crockpot Roast Beef and my Mississippi Pot Roast.
This recipe is from my old “Tuesdays with Dorie” baking days in the mid 2000s. This recipe is on page 23 in Dorie Greenspan’s book, Baking From My Home to Yours
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More Bread and Rolls Recipes
- Garlic Knots
- Parmesan Garlic Rolls
- Homemade Hawaiian Rolls
- Homemade Pull Apart Dinner Rolls
- Air Fryer Garlic Parmesan Twists
Homemade Biscuits
IMPORTANT - There are often Frequently Asked Questions within the blog post that you may find helpful. Simply scroll back up to read them!
Print It Rate ItIngredients
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 Tbsp. baking powder
- 2 tsp. sugar
- ½ tsp. salt
- 1 ¼ cups heavy cream
Things You'll Need
Before You Begin
- Freezing: The biscuits can be made to the point right before baking and frozen on the baking sheet. When frozen, wrap them airtight and they can be kept in the freezer for up to 2 months. Bake without defrosting – just add a couple more minutes to the oven time.
- Serving: Ideally these biscuits should go from oven to table and be served with cold sweet butter.
- Storing: You can keep the biscuits in a plastic bag overnight and give them a quick warm-up in the oven the next day, but you won't recapture their freshly made flakiness.
Instructions
- Getting ready: Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. Get out a sharp 2-inch-diameter biscuit cutter (I used a glass, and it was fine), and line a baking sheet with parchment or a silicone mat.
- Whisk the flour(s), baking powder, sugar and salt together in a bowl. Pour about 1 cup of the cream over the dry ingredients, grab a fork and start tossing the ingredients together. If necessary, add more cream, a spoonful at a time, until you’ve got a nice soft dough. Now reach into the bowl with your hands and give the dough a quick, gentle kneading – 3 or 4 turns should be just enough to bring everything together.
- Lightly dust a work surface with flour and turn out the dough. Dust the top of the dough very lightly with flour and pat the dough out with your hands or roll it with a pin until it is about 1/2 inch high. Don’t worry if the dough isn’t completely even – a quick, light touch is more important than accuracy.
- Use the biscuit cutter to cut out as many biscuits as you can. Try to cut the biscuits close to one another so you get the most you can out of this first round. By hand or with a small spatula, transfer the biscuits to the baking sheet. Gather together the scraps, working them as little as possible, pat out to a 1/2-inch thickness and cut as many additional biscuits as you can; transfer these to the sheet. (The biscuits can be made to this point and frozen on the baking sheet, then wrapped airtight and kept for up to 2 months. Bake without defrosting – just add a couple more minutes to the oven time.)
- Bake the biscuits for 14 to 18 minutes, or until they are tall, puffed and golden brown. Transfer them to a serving basket.
Nutrition
This post originally appeared here on Apr 20, 2010.
Amanda Davis
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margot says
You know it's a hit if there are no leftovers! They look perfect.
Heather Davis says
I really enjoyed making these biscuits as well. They went straight away in our house too!
Tracey says
Lovely biscuits – they rose beautifully! Mine were pretty flat, but still tasty and the recipe is easy enough that I can try again sometime.
Pamela says
Amanda, those biscuits look perfect!! Beautiful job.
Karen says
Yum! Your biscuits look perfect! :)
Anne says
Those look fluffy and delicious- yum! Awesome job!
Susan says
Your biscuits look great! We had them with chicken tenders, smothered in butter. The hubby loved them. I appreciated how easy they were to make. :)
Jeannette says
mmm your biscuits look great!
Kayte says
Oh, my they look lovely, no wonder your biscuit loving crew was ready to eat! I think I was supposed to put them in a basket…everyone seems to have these lovely linens and beautiful basket presentations…creativity is not my thing, but geesh, you would think I could have managed a basket…yours look so lovely in the one you have!
LDH says
They are looking perfect, Amanda!
Nickki says
Your biscuits look so tasty! I loved how simple this recipe was :-)
Sue says
Gonna have to try these.. I love hot bisquits with honey on them or with sausage gravy.
Tiffiny Felix says
Yum! :) We *love* biscuits :)
Grumpy and HoneyB says
They look awesome Amanda!
Cristine says
Your biscuits look great!
Katrina says
Definitely easy and good! Just like my favorite scone recipe, so when I see scones with lots of butter, I wonder why when they are perfect without it. Same with these biscuits. I'm pretty sure the biscuit recipe I used to make (don't make them very often) had shortening.
jose manuel says
Muy rica esta receta. Un saludo
Sweet and Savory says
Beautiful biscuits, Amanda.
Flourchild says
Your biscuits look so fluffy and good! Nice!
natalia says
Ciao Amanda they really look wonderful !! I love your site look !