Buttery Biscuits- Easy Homemade Biscuit Recipe

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These buttery biscuits have golden, crunchy tops, and melt-in-your-mouth insides. Slather these easy homemade biscuits in butter and jam or honey.

I’ve enjoyed cooking ever since I was a kid, but I really got into cooking when I was about 15. I was determined to learn how to make classic comfort food recipes completely from scratch– one of them being homemade biscuits.

I scoured the internet, researching all kinds of biscuit recipes from articles written by well-known bloggers to shaky home videos of southern grandmas making their down-home biscuit recipes in their kitchens. I was on a quest to figure out how to make buttery, melt-in-your-mouth, TALL biscuits from scratch.

After many trial and error attempts, I arrived at an easy homemade biscuit recipe that I felt pretty confident in: the perfect balance of buttery saltiness and sweetness. A little crunchy on the top…but soft, not stick-to-your-mouth dry. Oh, and BIG TALL biscuits.

Now, if I could, I’d just make you a fresh batch of these buttery biscuits in person so we could enjoy it together –’cause that’s my love language. But here’s the recipe so that you can whip up this easy biscuit recipe in your own kitchen 🙂

Why You’ll Love these Buttery Biscuits

Makes BIG Biscuits! – Of course you can make the biscuits as big or as small as you want, but I love making these into tall “Cathead”-style biscuits…it’s always a crowd pleaser. Everyone loves a big buttery biscuit they can slather in butter and jam! In this recipe, I have indicated the yield size as making 10 BIG biscuits (using a cutter that is 3.25″ in diameter and the dough being 3/4″ tall)…but do what you want!

*Note– if you’d like to make smaller biscuits (either shorter in height or smaller in diameter), check them after around 9-10 minutes of baking. Big biscuits will take closer to 12-15 minutes.

Golden crunchy outsides, soft and melt-in-your-mouth insides– the cold butter in the biscuit dough melts away in the oven to create heavenly, golden, buttery biscuits that melt in your mouth. 

Easy Biscuit Recipe!– This biscuit dough is pretty easy to whip up! Once you start adding in your milk, you’re looking to achieve a hydrated dough that can be easily pressed together with your hands (like playdough). Don’t knead the dough like you would when making bread. Just press the dough together so that it is fully incorporated, and then cut out your biscuits. Oh, and they can be a little bumpy on the tops….they don’t need to be perfect! I think that’s what makes these biscuits so eye-catching!

Ingredients: 

• 4 c. all-purpose flour (I highly recommend King Arthur All-Purpose Flour for texture and taste!)
• 4 tsp. granulated cane sugar
• 2 tsp. sea salt
• 2 tbsp. Baking powder 
• 2 sticks (16 tbsp) COLD salted butter, cubed
• 1 1/2 c. whole milk (almond milk works well too)

Tips: 

How to “cut in butter”

The phrase “cut in butter” means to incorporate cold butter into a dry ingredient mixture like flour. This results in little pieces of butter being coated by flour — resembling “course crumbs”.

To cut in butter, use a pastry blender, a fork, or your fingertips.

• If using a pastry blender, press down and twist, press down and twist
• If using a fork, press the fork down and backward.
• If using your hands, work the butter into the flour using a pinching motion with your fingertips against your palms.

Use COLD butter for this process. This is so that the butter stays intact enough to form the little chunks coated in flour that melt away in the oven, leaving little pockets of buttery crispness.

How to achieve the correct consistency for biscuit dough

Biscuit dough should be hydrated, only slightly sticky, and slightly crumbly (large blobs of dough that can be pressed together easily). If the dough is too wet, it will be too sticky to work with and won’t cut out into biscuit rounds easily.

To achieve the correct dough consistency, add the milk A LITTLE AT A TIME so that you don’t end up with a dough that is too wet. The dough can behave differently from day to day based on humidity and atmospheric conditions. Some days you may need to add the full 1 1/2 cups of milk, and some days you may find you need less milk.

What to do if the biscuit dough is too dry or too wet

If you have added in the full amount of milk and the biscuit dough is still too dry, add in a little more milk until the correct consistency is achieved. If you accidentally end up with a dough that is too wet, add in a little more flour to help firm up the dough.

Ways to Enjoy Buttery Biscuits

Oh man… if you’ve never had a buttery, soft, melt in your mouth biscuit…you NEED to make these and enjoy them ASAP. 

These guys are some serious comfort food. You can enjoy them simply with butter and a good jam or honey. Try with my Whipped Honey Butter!

For a hearty breakfast or brunch, you can serve these with eggs, bacon, and cheese so that people can make breakfast sandwiches with them. 

These also pair well with any soup or entree as a filling, comforting side dish. 

Try with my Easy Instant Pot Black Eyed Peas, Savory Ground Beef and Kale, or Black Eyed Pea Vegetable Soup. A classic American pairing is fried chicken and biscuits or biscuits and gravy.

Biscuits can be filling, so I wouldn’t pair these with a meal that is already bread-based or super starchy like a pasta dish. 

So go and make you a pan of fresh-from-the-oven, buttery biscuits. And ENJOY them!

How to Make Buttery Biscuits

Preheat your oven to 450 degrees F. Grease a large baking sheet or line it with parchment paper. 

In a large mixing bowl, whisk the all-purpose flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt together until well incorporated. 

Cut the COLD butter into 1/4 inch cubes and immediately add them into the flour (they should still be really cold). Cut in the butter until the flour mixture resembles course crumbs (use a pastry blender, fork, or your fingers!). 

Add in the milk, 1/4 cup at a time, mixing the dough with your fingers as you add it in. Add in milk until you arrive at a hydrated, slightly sticky dough that has a few crumbs but can be easily pressed together into a ball. 

Turn out your dough onto a lightly floured surface and press the dough gently into a round that is 3/4 inch tall (doesn’t need to be perfectly round). I find that a silicone dough mat works very well for this and is easy to clean up!

*NOTE— you can make these biscuits as tall/large or short/small as you want. Adjust the height of the dough and/or the diameter of your biscuit cutter for different sizes of biscuits.

Flour the rim of a drinking glass or biscuit cutter size of your choice, and press down into the dough and twist to create biscuit rounds ( I use a drinking glass that is 3.25 inches in diameter…here is a set of biscuit cutters that includes a 3.25″ one!). Press down, twist, press down, twist. Reflour the biscuit cutter as you need. 

Place the biscuit rounds on your greased baking sheet (or lined with parchment paper) and bake for 9-15 minutes until your biscuits are golden. (The size you make your biscuits will determine how much baking time they need. For small, short biscuits, check them at 9 minutes. For big tall biscuits, expect them to need closer to 12-15 minutes). 

*Tip- a bench scraper makes cleaning leftover bits of dough and flour super easy!

Serve your biscuits warm with butter and jam or honey. These pair so perfectly with a meal like Savory Ground Beef and Kale, Black Eyed Pea Vegetable Soup, or Pot Roast with Sweet Potatoes!

Enjoy! 

Want More Easy and Delicious Recipes?

• Pot Roast with Sweet Potatoes (Foolproof!)
• Easy Sheet Pan Potatoes with Bacon and Asparagus
• Savory Ground Beef and Kale
• Crispy Chicken Thighs with Sourdough Stuffing
• Black Eyed Pea Vegetable Soup

Shop this Post

• pastry blender
• silicone pastry dough mat
• biscuit cutter
• large baking sheet
• bench scraper/dough knife

Hey! Thanks for stopping by. Give this recipe 5 stars if you try it and love it!

Wherever you find yourself today…take time to nourish yourself — body, mind, and soul <3

Warmly, Caroline