Cornbread Biscuits

Notes: The corn powder mentioned in the recipe is ripped off from my Baking Savior; Christina Tosi. It is made by blending freeze dried corn into a powder, but I was very lazy and just measured the corn into a bag and crushed it with a wine botte ad fine as I could. This recipe took me 5 tries before I could accept it as a self respecting southerner, don’t judge me please. Also, the Corn Flour mentioned refers to Bob’s Red Mill brand’s gluten free corn based flour.

Yields 16 Biscuits

1.     Place 75g of cornmeal and 325g of buttermilk in a saucepan over medium heat and stir until the mixture thickens- the mixture should hold its shape when a whisk or spatula is dragged through it. (Basically,
you’re just making some grits) When the corn pudding mixture is at the desired thickness, scrape it out of the pan and into a bowl to set aside to cool.

2.      Grate frozen butter and shortening, wrap up in plastic wrap and chill in the refrigerator.

3.      Whisk the rest of the cornmeal, cake flour, all purpose flour, corn flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, sugar, corn powder, and yeast into a separate bowl.

4.      Pour half of the buttermilk into the corn pudding, and whisk to make sure that the mix is room temp before whisking in the egg.

5.      Take the chilled fat out of the refrigerator and place into the bowl with the dry ingredients. Toss the fat into the dry ingredients with clean hands until just coated.

6.      Stir in the corn kernels and pour in the corn pudding mixture. Add the other half of the buttermilk gradually until the dough just comes together.

7.      When the flour has been hydrated, and the dough can be formed into a ball, wrap the dough in plastic and chill in the refrigerator for 1 hour (you can also rest this dough overnight and roll, proof and bake the biscuits the next day).

8.      Dust your work surface with cake flour. Then, imagine the rolled-out dough has been separated into three sections. Fold the left section over the middle and then fold the right section over this. Turn the dough and repeat this process. Roll out the dough for a third time and fold in half. Roll to the height of your biscuit cutter or if you would like to cut squares instead- roll to the height of the length of your second knuckle to
your fingertip. 

9.      Place the cut biscuits onto a parchment lined sheet pan (or use a silpat) with about an inch and a halt between them and cover with a tea towel or plastic wrap. Let the biscuits rise for 20 minutes.

10.      As the biscuits rise, preheat your oven to 425 F. Once ready to be baked, brush the tops of the biscuits with buttermilk and sprinkle with salt. Bake for 15 minutes and turn the pans before baking for a
final 15 minutes or until the edges of the biscuits turn a golden brown.