Tis the season you know. For strawberries. Tart, sweet, red, juicy...known in my house as ambrosia. My girls could eat a million of these puppies. So, what else do you do besides make homemade strawberry freezer jam? You make strawberry shortcake. Oh, but not just any strawberry shortcake. You make some seriously good strawberry shortcake.
Come on. You know you want some. There's a trick to strawberry shortcake...well, there's a couple of tricks. First, you gotta make your own biscuits. Second, you've got to use fresh strawberries. Third, you've got to have two kinds of cream. The whipped kind and the whole whipping cream...unwhipped...for moistness, richness and just plain goodness. I come from a family who thinks a little cream makes everything better...and doesn't it?
First make your biscuits. Now this is my usual biscuit recipe that I use all the time. Except for now that I'm low-carb. Blah. But, I've mixed it up a little bit, because while I don't want a biscuit so sweet it's gonna give you a cavity, I do want it a touch sweeter than normal. DO NOT buy those weird little sponge cakes made specifically for strawberry shortcake. Don't do it. You will be amazed by how much better this is. My beloved mother who apparently didn't believe in scratch biscuits, used Bisquick when I was young, but added a bit more sugar. That's essentially what I've done, but with the best drop biscuits you'll ever eat recipe.
Strawberry Shortcake Biscuits
2 C. Flour
2 tsp Baking Powder
1/2 tsp Baking Soda
3 Tbl. Sugar and some extra for sprinkling on top...the regular biscuit recipe is 1 tsp sugar.
3/4 tsp Salt
1 C. Buttermilk (make sure it's nice and cold...you're going to perform some culinary magic in a bit)
8 Tbl. Butter...yeah...an entire cube...melted and cooled...it's part of the magic I was talking about above.
Preheat oven to 475 F. I know, hot right?
Combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar and salt in a bowl.
Take your cooled butter (even if it's not completely cool, I still go for it) and pour it into the buttermilk. Stir it about and you'll notice as the butter hits the cool liquid, it's going to form solid bits of butter floating about in the buttermilk. The magic is this...as it cooks, these will melt and form steam which will them make your biscuits light and fluffy and almost as if you made rolled biscuits but without the pain and harassment.
Pour the butter/buttermilk combo into your dry ingredients and stir until just combined. I know you've heard this before, but do it. You don't want tough biscuits. Overstirring will cause tough biscuits. Gross.
Drop your dough by large spoonful onto a cookie sheet covered in parchment. This will make 12 biscuits. Try and portion them correctly, but I never do so I always have to go back and either steal from dough lumps or add more to the ones that look smallish. Sprinkle lightly with more sugar.
Bake for 13 minutes. I have this down to a science in my oven. 13 minutes. Unless I'm doing a half batch and then it's 12 minutes. So I would say check at 12, you may need to go a touch longer. The biscuits should be golden brown and smell like heaven.
Strawberries for Strawberry Shortcake
2 lbs. Strawberries. Washed.
Sugar...whatever makes them taste good. I think I used less than 1/4 C. But they were particularly sweet and tasty.
You want to mush 1/3 of your strawberries in a bowl. Just mush em good. Then you want to slice the remaining 2/3 of the berries and add them to the mush. This is the perfect percentage for perfect strawberry goodness in your strawberry shortcake. Stir and add sugar until you think it is sweet enough. Let sit until ready to serve.
Whipped Cream...or be like me and buy some in the can...I was outside I couldn't make it fresh
1 pint whipped cream
1/4 C. Sugar...or whatever is needed to taste good
Dash of vanilla
Place cream in stand mixer. Start out at a medium speed and once the cream has noticeably thickened, then jam it up to high and mix until soft peaks have formed. You don't want to over beat your cream as that will give you butter.
Heavy Cream
This is used for sogging it up a big. Nobody wants to eat dry strawberry shortcake. Trust me on this. use the cream.
Now assemble. It's easy. Place biscuit in bowl. Top with a good portion of strawberries. Pour a nice amount of cream over this. Over the entire top place a good dollop of whipped whipped cream. Devour and love life.
Thanks for reading and please, please, please, make this recipe.
Heather
Come on. You know you want some. There's a trick to strawberry shortcake...well, there's a couple of tricks. First, you gotta make your own biscuits. Second, you've got to use fresh strawberries. Third, you've got to have two kinds of cream. The whipped kind and the whole whipping cream...unwhipped...for moistness, richness and just plain goodness. I come from a family who thinks a little cream makes everything better...and doesn't it?
First make your biscuits. Now this is my usual biscuit recipe that I use all the time. Except for now that I'm low-carb. Blah. But, I've mixed it up a little bit, because while I don't want a biscuit so sweet it's gonna give you a cavity, I do want it a touch sweeter than normal. DO NOT buy those weird little sponge cakes made specifically for strawberry shortcake. Don't do it. You will be amazed by how much better this is. My beloved mother who apparently didn't believe in scratch biscuits, used Bisquick when I was young, but added a bit more sugar. That's essentially what I've done, but with the best drop biscuits you'll ever eat recipe.
Strawberry Shortcake Biscuits
2 C. Flour
2 tsp Baking Powder
1/2 tsp Baking Soda
3 Tbl. Sugar and some extra for sprinkling on top...the regular biscuit recipe is 1 tsp sugar.
3/4 tsp Salt
1 C. Buttermilk (make sure it's nice and cold...you're going to perform some culinary magic in a bit)
8 Tbl. Butter...yeah...an entire cube...melted and cooled...it's part of the magic I was talking about above.
Preheat oven to 475 F. I know, hot right?
Combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar and salt in a bowl.
Take your cooled butter (even if it's not completely cool, I still go for it) and pour it into the buttermilk. Stir it about and you'll notice as the butter hits the cool liquid, it's going to form solid bits of butter floating about in the buttermilk. The magic is this...as it cooks, these will melt and form steam which will them make your biscuits light and fluffy and almost as if you made rolled biscuits but without the pain and harassment.
Pour the butter/buttermilk combo into your dry ingredients and stir until just combined. I know you've heard this before, but do it. You don't want tough biscuits. Overstirring will cause tough biscuits. Gross.
Drop your dough by large spoonful onto a cookie sheet covered in parchment. This will make 12 biscuits. Try and portion them correctly, but I never do so I always have to go back and either steal from dough lumps or add more to the ones that look smallish. Sprinkle lightly with more sugar.
Bake for 13 minutes. I have this down to a science in my oven. 13 minutes. Unless I'm doing a half batch and then it's 12 minutes. So I would say check at 12, you may need to go a touch longer. The biscuits should be golden brown and smell like heaven.
Strawberries for Strawberry Shortcake
2 lbs. Strawberries. Washed.
Sugar...whatever makes them taste good. I think I used less than 1/4 C. But they were particularly sweet and tasty.
You want to mush 1/3 of your strawberries in a bowl. Just mush em good. Then you want to slice the remaining 2/3 of the berries and add them to the mush. This is the perfect percentage for perfect strawberry goodness in your strawberry shortcake. Stir and add sugar until you think it is sweet enough. Let sit until ready to serve.
Whipped Cream...or be like me and buy some in the can...I was outside I couldn't make it fresh
1 pint whipped cream
1/4 C. Sugar...or whatever is needed to taste good
Dash of vanilla
Place cream in stand mixer. Start out at a medium speed and once the cream has noticeably thickened, then jam it up to high and mix until soft peaks have formed. You don't want to over beat your cream as that will give you butter.
Heavy Cream
This is used for sogging it up a big. Nobody wants to eat dry strawberry shortcake. Trust me on this. use the cream.
Now assemble. It's easy. Place biscuit in bowl. Top with a good portion of strawberries. Pour a nice amount of cream over this. Over the entire top place a good dollop of whipped whipped cream. Devour and love life.
Thanks for reading and please, please, please, make this recipe.
Heather
I was lucky enough to try this and it was very yummy!! A little sog does a shortcake good.
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