Best Biscuits

This post involves so many of my favorite things...  one of my all-time favorite restaurants, my favorite new cookbook, and my favorite meal...  brunch.  The biscuit recipe is adapted from one in the Tupelo Honey Cafe Cookbook, a gift from Derek's mom and my new favorite cookbook, especially for brunch options.  The Tupelo Honey Cafe is arguable the most famous and beloved restaurant in Asheville, NC and is one of our very favorites (well, Derek's ultimate favorite might be Salsa's).  Brunch is most definitely my favorite meal, full of all of breakfast's most decadent delights and brimming with excuses to drink a cocktail before noon (well, unless it's a Sunday because apparently that's against the law here).  Hats off to you mimosa and bloody Mary.  Pictured here is a biscuit dripping with my Crystalized Ginger and Champagne Jam, next to a veggie egg scramble much like the one here, but adapted to what's in season now for summer.  In the background, you can see a hint of the stem to the glass holding my mimosa, a great compliment to the champagne in this jam.  Aaah, brunch, you never disappoint.  

Recipe:

-2 c flour

-1 Tbsp baking powder

-1/4 tsp baking soda

-1 tsp salt, plus more for sprinkling

-2 Tbsp sour cream (or plain yogurt)

-3/4 c unsalted butter, frozen, plus some for brushing

-1/2-3/4 c plain yogurt

->Preheat oven to 450 degrees.  Mix dry ingredients together.  Add sour cream and mix until incorporated.  Grate butter on largest size.  Mix into flour mixture with either a pastry blender or with forks until like small peas.  Add yogurt until mixture comes together into a moist dough ball.  Don't over mix.  Roll out on a floured surface to a one-inch thickness.  Cut biscuits with a 3-inch biscuit cutter or a similar-sized drinking glass.  

Place on a baking sheet and into the preheated oven on the top rack.  Bake until golden brown (about 20 minutes).  Remove from the oven, brush or rub with butter and then sprinkle with salt.  Put back in the oven about 5 more minutes.  Pull them out and enjoy with jam, honey, and/or butter.  

~*TIP:  I think a few things that make this recipe so easy and these biscuits so delicious are the grated frozen butter and the last-minute butter and salt addition.  I've never heard of doing either, but don't skip these steps!  They are what give you the most buttery, flaky, and flavorful biscuits.  Also, the original recipe calls for buttermilk, rather than yogurt, but I've made them with yogurt twice now (because that's what I had on hand), and I've had stellar results both times.  *~