Ready to Cook
INSTRUCTIONS
Step 1) Mix the dry stuff together: 2 cups of flour, 1 teaspoon of baking soda, 1 tablespoon of baking powder, and 1 teaspoon of salt.
Step 2) Cut the 8 tablespoons of butter into the dry mixture. You’ll end up with a dry, oatmeal consistency.
Step 3) Pour in your cup of half and half. But you could use buttermilk, kefir, spoiled milk, vinegar-ed milk, or even just plain old milk. You’ll need a cup or more depending on the liquid’s consistency and how packed your cups of flour ended up being. You could even use plain yogurt but you’ll usually need much more than a cup of yogurt due to the thickness of the yogurt.
Step 4) Mix around with a rubber or silicone spatula big enough to handle the load. A big bamboo wooden spoon would work too.
Step 5) “Flour” or dust the top of your table or working surface and plop out the dough onto the floured surface. Then, dust the top of the sticky dough with a bit more flour.
Step 6) Flattened and fold over the dough a few times; don’t knead the dough like bread. Make a single, large, round circle from the all of the dough about as big around as the diameter of the bottom of the pot or pan you’ll be baking these biscuits in.
Step 7) Cut the individual biscuits out from the dough. A biscuit cutter works best but a coffee cup, paper cup, or even a knife to cut square biscuits. But don’t worry about being perfectly round or even on each and every one. It’s okay to have weird shapes and odd sizes.
Step 8) Place the cut biscuits in a 10-inch cast iron camp Dutch oven that has been buttered up real nice. Trust me when I say “buttered up.” Butter is the key to keep these biscuits both flavorful as well as keeping them from sticking. Butter is the key here.
Step 9) Scramble an egg up real good and using one of those kitchen paint brushes (basing brush), paint the top of those dudes with a thin layer of scrambled egg.
Step 10) Put the lid back on your camp cast iron Dutch oven and place the oven over 6 or 7 briquettes. Place 13 or 14 briquettes on top of the lid.
Step 11) Let the biscuits bake for about 10 minutes. Then, give the Dutch oven and the lid a ⅓ turn. Lift the lid just a bit and take a peek. Note not only the tops but also the bottoms of the biscuits (as well as you can visualize). Are the bottoms toasting well? If not, close in those bottom briquettes a bit closer to the center of the circle toward the middle of the Dutch oven.
Step 12) Wait another 10 minutes and take another look-see. They are likely done at this point. Cook longer if you plan to eat right away. But, if you have other things to cook or that are still cooking, remember this: that hot pot will continue baking those biscuits even after you remove the heat from the pot.
Once they’re done, get the jelly out, and start munching.
Enjoy
Chef Tip: Note the time you will keep those biscuits in that pot as you cook the other ingredients. As they cool, they will steam and condensation will form. If they sit in the pot too long, they will get soggy from their collected steam moisture.