Honey-Whole Wheat Biscuits

After a late night out on Saturday evening, I was looking forward to a really relaxing Sunday.  I found some leftover "kitchen sink" spicy vegetable soup in the freezer and I decided to thaw it out for dinner.  I browsed through my favorite cookbook - King Arthur Flour's Whole Grain Baking Cookbook - to find a recipe for bread or rolls to compliment the soup.  I finally settled upon a recipe for Honey-Whole Wheat Biscuits and I decided to give it a try.

First, I put the mostly-thawed soup on the stove in the Dutch oven to slowly heat up while I worked on the biscuits.

Then, I gathered up my ingredients for the biscuits:

• 2 1/2 cups white whole wheat flour (you can also use traditional whole wheat flour)
• 1/2 cup unbleached bread flour
• 2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup (1 stick or 4 ounces) cold unsalted butter
• 1 large egg
• 3/4 cup buttermilk, plus more for brushing
• 3 tablespoons honey

I pre-heated the oven to 400 degrees and lined a baking sheet with parchment paper.

I whisked together the flours, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a large mixing bowl.

Using the food processor, I cut the butter into a coarse crumb texture and set it aside.

In another separate bowl, I whisked together the egg, buttermilk and honey. 

I then added the butter and the liquid mixture to the flour mixture.  I blended the dough together lightly and quickly with a fork until the mixture was evenly moistened.

I lightly floured a board and turned the dough onto the floured board.  I used both my hands and a dough scraper to fold the dough several times until it came together.

Bret helped me out and lightly rolled the dough out with a rolling stick until it was about 3/4 inch thick.  For some reason, he is just way better at rolling out dough than I am!

I cut the dough using the top of a drinking glass (which I had lightly sprayed with cooking spray).  The cookbook actually advises you against doing this because the edge of the glass is rounded and not sharp like a biscuit cutter.  Using a glass will pinch the dough's layers before cutting through them, and this can keep the dough from rising - which makes a more dense biscuit.  But since I didn't have a biscuit cutter (and didn't feel like running out to get one), I decided to take my chances.

I put the biscuit rounds on the parchment-lined baking sheet and brushed the top of the biscuits with buttermilk.

I baked the biscuits for about fifteen minutes, until the tops were golden brown.  We ate the biscuits hot out of the oven with a big bowl of vegetable soup.  The biscuits didn't rise as much as I'd like but they were still light and oh so delicious!

And the soup was still super spicy and flavorful after several months in the freezer!

I had a couple of meals out this weekend so these biscuits were definitely the best thing I whipped up in the kitchen all weekend.  Tell me, what was the best thing you made in your kitchen this weekend?