Strawberry Shortcake With Sourdough Discard Drop Biscuits

No dessert drumrolls the nice and cozy climate season fairly like strawberry shortcake. Floral-sweet berries swimming in their very own juices, smooth pillows of cream, supported by a easy, personal-sized, cake. Most of the time (together with this case) that cake is definitely a biscuit. The place cake could be spongy or dense, the within of a biscuit is pillowy-soft—the proper texture to pair with whipped cream and juicy berries. And a biscuit made with sourdough starter discard for a bit of additional tang? A lot the higher. Plus, when the climate is heat, you in all probability don’t wish to spend an excessive amount of time inside with the oven on: These sourdough starter discard drop biscuits are accomplished in about half an hour, from begin to end.

Personally, I feel the perfect car for shortcake is a drop biscuit, particularly a cream-based model. The dough, which is simply six elements, comes collectively in exactly 10 minutes, then is solely dropped—or scooped, you’ll see—onto a sheet pan. (No reducing in butter, no pre-bake chilling!) Heavy cream retains the biscuits tender and wealthy, the place the sourdough starter discard provides only a smidge of tang to the completed product—all the time welcome in my ebook in terms of wealthy, candy treats.

Talking of, the opposite parts wanted for strawberry shortcake come collectively shortly. Whereas the biscuits bake and funky, macerate strawberries in a little bit of lime juice and sugar, which pulls out the berries’ moisture, making a pure sauce. You would spoon these berries over plain whipped cream, however I prefer to name again to the tang of the biscuit by folding in a little bit of Greek yogurt.

Use Sourdough Starter Discard At Any Temperature

As is the case with most of my sourdough starter discard bakes, this recipe could be made with unfed starter straight out of your refrigerated starter cache, or from a lately fed, room temperature starter discard. The starter is used to exchange a few of the flour and liquid within the recipe, however will get its elevate from chemical leavener (on this case, baking powder).

The Finest Shortcakes Are Drop Biscuits

Drop biscuits are so named as a result of the dough is blended, then merely dropped onto a sheet pan. Versus roll-and-cut biscuits, which have a smooth, pull-apart-flaky inside, drop biscuits have a young, cakey texture, with none sponginess (suppose: a scone versus a sponge cake). On the subject of giving biscuits the shortcake remedy, I truly want this barely denser crumb and brief, barely crumbly exterior to that of a shatteringly crisp layered biscuit: It helps whipped cream, but soaks up berry juices with out going soggy.

Laminated roll-and-cut biscuit dough is full of butter and folded over itself a number of occasions, much like croissant or some types of pie dough, flaky layers borne from oven-melted-then-steamed shards of butter. Drop biscuit dough, nevertheless, is solely blended, then dropped onto a sheet pan in spoonfuls (although for the least mess and most even biscuits, I want to portion them with a cookie scoop.)

Whereas you can also make drop biscuits with butter and one other liquid, usually a dairy product (see under) the one fats in these biscuits comes from heavy cream. Whilst you’ll sacrifice some richness and crisp texture, there are many advantages to creating cream-only drop biscuits: The elements listing is shorter; and there’s no chilling wanted earlier than baking to make sure the butter stays as chilly as potential, as is usually required with roll-and-cut biscuits. It’s additionally vital to bear in mind you’re about to slather the biscuits in whipped cream, so further richness by way of butter isn’t particularly wanted on this utility.

Heavy Cream Retains The Shortcakes Tender and Wealthy

To make room for sourdough starter discard, you’ll want to drag again on a few of the extra liquid you’d usually add to a biscuit. At about 58% water and 42% milkfat, heavy cream gives a substantial amount of hydration and fats to scones. Different water-heavier dairy merchandise typically present in shortcakes like buttermilk, complete milk, yogurt (complete milk or full-fat Greek), or bitter cream primarily present hydration, for essentially the most tender biscuit you’d seemingly want so as to add butter and/or egg yolk. Within the curiosity of conserving this recipe easy, I went all cream—together with the water current within the sourdough starter, in fact. 

There are a handful of easy biscuit ratios recognized amongst bakers, some of the frequent being 3:2:1 (components flour, liquid, and fats respectively) by weight. One other well-liked ratio for easy drop biscuits particularly is a 1:1 ratio (by weight) of self-rising flour to cream (or two components flour to at least one half cream by quantity). Conserving these formulation in thoughts, accounting for each the flour and liquid current in sourdough starter discard, the next biscuit was born.

Stabilize (and Taste!) the Whipped Cream with Greek Yogurt

For whipped cream that’s wealthy, with a smidge of tang to play on the sourdough biscuits, I prefer to beat heavy cream into very smooth peaks, then fold in tart Greek yogurt. The thick yogurt additionally helps stabilize the whipped cream, so it may be ready prematurely, must you wish to make your shortcake parts solely prematurely, then assemble if you’re able to serve. An excellent occasion trick, if I could say so!

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Sourdough Discard Drop Biscuits FAQ

What’s Subsequent?

See our assortment of sourdough starter discard recipes for extra inspiration on what to do with that discard (like Italian lemon cake!).