sweet potato biscuits $2.44 recipe / $0.31 serving
I don't make biscuits often because they're just a bunch of flour and butter, but when I saw this recipe, I knew I had to make them. Sweet potatoes are packed full of nutrients so in addition to making these biscuits taste fantastic, they also successfully reduced my guilt while I indulged. And, if you're already starting to plan your Thanksgiving menu, sweet potato biscuits would make a very unique addition!Chow.com suggests using these incredible biscuits to make ham sandwiches and I must say, I'm really bummed that I didn't try this. Oh well, I guess I'll have to make more. Poor me.
Using the microwave to quickly cook the sweet potato makes these biscuits come together very quickly. Also, I have a hunch (it's just a hunch, mind you) that you could replace the one cup of mashed sweet potato with a cup of canned pumpkin puree. If anyone is brave enough to try it out, let me know how it works!
Recipe reprinted from Chow.com - Sweet Potato Biscuits
Total Recipe cost: $2.44
Servings Per Recipe: 8
Cost per serving: $0.31
Prep time: 15 min. Cook time: 20 min. Total: 35 min.
| INGREDIENTS | COST | |
| 1 medium (1 lb.) | sweet potato | $0.68 |
| 3/4 cup | whole milk | $0.29 |
| 2-2.5 cups | all-purpose flour | $0.36 |
| 1 Tbsp | baking powder | $0.09 |
| 1/4 tsp | baking soda | $0.02 |
| 1 Tbsp | sugar | $0.03 |
| 1/2 tsp | salt | $0.02 |
| 8 Tbsp (1 stick) | butter, frozen | $0.95 |
| TOTAL | $2.44 | |
STEP 1: Wash the outside of the sweet potato, dry with a towel, and prick the skin with a fork. Wrap the sweet potato in a paper towel and microwave on high for 5 minutes. If the potato is still hard in the center, turn the sweet potato over and microwave for an additional 3-5 minutes. Let the potato sit at room temperature until cool enough to handle.
STEP 2: While the sweet potato is cooking, combine the dry ingredients in a bowl (flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, and salt). Grate the frozen butter into the bowl and stir until it is coated with the flour mixture. (Place the butter in the freezer about an hour ahead of time)
STEP 3: Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Scoop the soft inside of the sweet potato into a bowl and mash until smooth. You want about 1 cup of mashed sweet potato. Add the milk and whisk until relatively smooth.
STEP 4: Add the sweet potato and milk mixture to the bowl with the flour and butter. Stir just until everything is mixed and no dry flour is left at the bottom of the bowl. Turn the dough out onto a floured surface and work in just enough flour so that it doesn't stick to your hands. Try not to over work the dough.
STEP 5: Roll the dough out to about 3/4 inches thick. Using a wide-mouthed cup or a biscuit cutter, cut the dough into eight rounds. When necessary, pile the scraps up and re-roll out the dough to cut more biscuits. You should have about 8 total.
STEP 6: Place the biscuits on a parchment lined baking sheet and bake in the preheated 400 degree oven for 15-20 minutes or until lightly golden brown on top. Enjoy with a pat of melted butter on top!
Step By Step Photos
First wash then poke the sweet potato with a fork. This allows steam to escape while it cooks so that you don't have an exploding hot potato in your microwave.
Wrap the sweet potato in a paper towel and microwave on high for five minutes. You might want to also put it on a plate because the bottom might get a little wet. If it's not completely soft - like, very VERY soft - all the way through, flip the potato over and cook for another 3-5 minutes. When it's done, let it sit for a minute until it's cool enough to handle.
While the sweet potato is cooking, mix together the dry ingredients (flour, salt, sugar, baking powder, and baking soda).
Next, grate in the frozen butter. Stir the grated butter until it is coated in the flour mixture. I put my stick of butter in the freezer about an hour ahead of time. That way it was hard enough to handle and grate without melting, but it wasn't rock solid.
Slice the sweet potato open and scoop out the flesh.
Mash up the sweet potato as much as possible. This is why you want the potato cooked to the point of extreme softness. You'll want to use about one cup of mashed sweet potato. If you have any extra, just eat it because it's DELICIOUS. Right?
Add the milk and whisk it together.
Whisk until it's fairly smooth like this. You'll probably have a few small chunks, but that's okay.
Add the sweet potato mixture to the butter and flour mixture. Stir just until there isn't any dry flour left on the bottom of the bowl.
At that point, you'll have a fairly soft and slightly sticky dough. Turn this out onto a floured surface and work in just enough flour to keep it from sticking to your hands. Try to knead as little as possible. If you can roll it out without kneading anymore flour in, do so.
Roll out the dough until it is about 3/4 inches thick, or half as thick as you want the finished biscuit to be.
Use something round to cut the biscuits out of the dough. I rolled mine way too thin and ended up getting 12 biscuits, but you should probably yield about 8. Pile up the scraps, re-roll it out and cut more biscuits as needed. Again, try to work the dough as little as possible. The more it is manipulated, the more chewy and the less flakey the biscuits will be.
Place the biscuits on a parchment lined baking sheet and bake in a preheated 400 degree oven for about 15-20 minutes or until lightly golden on top. Again, I rolled these way too thin. Try to make yours about twice as thick as this.
And when they're finished, you and your family will be very very happy.
Oh, yes.
34 comments:
Beth! I've been following your blog for over a year and have found it super useful (and inspirational). I would love it if you joined Google+ (see my post at https://plus.google.com/u/0/103300363750121441954/posts/WtuM6QR9Ncn) so I could spread the awesomeness further :)
I know what I'm doing tomorrow..
I bet these would be fabulous with cinnamon honey butter!
Totally making these tomorrow!
Do you think it would be OK to be lazy about rolling and make these as drop biscuits? I really don't have a counter big enough for rolling and cutting so I try to avoid it whenever possible.
You can definitely use pumpkin. Pumpkin scones are an Australian CLASSIC.
Sounds great. But is a whole milk a must? Or can you substitute 1%?
Kathleen - I'm sure you could use 1%. There is so much butter in the recipe that a little less milk fat probably won't make a difference :P
Thanks for sharing this, Beth. I love sweet potatoes and my family loves biscuits, especially my 6 yr old. I think there are a lot of options with this recipe.
Yum these look amazing! So why the frozen butter? I know we frequently use cold butter to make crumbly dough, but I just never really knew WHY! These look amazing though!
I agree with cinnamon honey butter - YUM!
These look unbelievably good!Along the lines with what Kathleen asked, do you you could use a butter substitute product to make these?
This might even work with a sausage gravy. I know Pine State Biscuits puts maple syrup in their gravy for a touch of sweetness.
Betsy - Freezing the butter here just allows it to be hard enough to grate. Grating is just a quick way of "cutting" the butter into the flour mixture :) Butter should always be cold when making biscuits and pie crusts because the more small pieces of butter (like, little chunks) the flakier your biscuits and pie crusts will be. If it melts into the flour mixture, it will just be an even texture with no flakey-ness. I hope that makes sense! :)
Matt - I don't think you can use a butter substitute. You need real fat to make the biscuit texture. Reduced fat butter products usually have added water which would ruin the texture. It's kind of an all or nothing thing with biscuits! :P
I just love everything about this blog. It's so clear to me the time you take to make it beautiful with pictures, well-organized with information, and well-written with clear instructions. Thanks so much for all your hard work.
I have a granddaughter who must follow a low protein diet and I think this recipe might just become a staple as sweet potatoes are a favorite and there is less flour (protein) in these. Thanks.
Mmmmm I LOVE these!
I made them tonight with 1% milk and butternut squash instead of potato. They were absolutely divine, although ended up fairly thin; I think the squash had a bit too much water. However, they were super easy for the kids to eat and we enjoyed them thoroughly. Thank you!
I made these tonight with 1% milk and brown sugar instead of white. I didn't roll them out though. I used a 1/4 measuring cup and patted them out on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. I did get eight though. I have to admit the last two were on the large side though. They were pretty good. I made a cinnamon-honey butter and served them with ham and beans.
These delightful sweet potato biscuits complement any homemade meal, bringing a sense of warmth and sweetness to the table.
This looks great-tasting sweets!
Matt -- if it's the dairy that's the issue and not the fat content, you could probably try using shortening instead of butter. I often use shortening when making regular biscuits because it's a little more economical and although they lack the rich buttery taste, I don't notice a significant texture difference.
Beth -- these look amazing. I think we might skip our traditional Hawaiian rolls and put these on the Thanksgiving table instead this year!
Our microwave is broken, and boiling a sweet potato til soft may take too long... Beth, do you think canned sweet potatoes might just do the trick instead?
Canned sweet potatoes have quite a bit more moisture in them (same with boiled) and I'm afraid that if you just add more flour, the ratio of the rest of the ingredients might be thrown way off. Hmm... I can't think of another option :(
Wow thanks for such a quick response. No worries, I'll save this as an inaugural recipe for a new microwave...! Seems worth the wait :)
Erica, what about baking them? It might take a while as well, but likely wouldn't add the extra moisture that boiling would.
Beth, do you think these could work with whole wheat flour as well? I'd like to think that making biscuits with sweet potatoes and whole wheat makes up for using whole milk and a stick of butter. ;)
So excited to make these anyway!
Jessica - I've never tried biscuits with whole wheat flour because I assumed they'd be too dense... but it might be worth a try! If you do, let us know how they turn out.
For an extra indulgence - dessert or special brunch item, maybe - mix a block of cream cheese with some finely grated fresh ginger or ground ginger and a little sugar. Use this instead of butter on your biscuits. Our local bakery does sweet potato biscuits with ginger cream cheese and they are sooo yummy!
Made these biscuits today, I followed the recipe and I got 15(!) medium sized biscuits. So yummy! My boyfriend can't stop eating them. I'm tempted to substitute pumpkin instead of sweet potato. Would be a nice addition for Thanksgiving dinner. Thank you so much for this recipe, we really love it :)
Do you think it would work to freeze the biscuits after the rolling/ cutting step and then take them out and bake them a few at a time?
Sarah - I can only guess since I've never done it, but I'm pretty sure that's how the frozen biscuits at the supermarket are made! I say give it a shot!
Made these the other day and they turned out amazing. Try using them instead of an english muffin for breakfast sandwiches!
These were fantastic and got a HUGE thumbs up from my husband. This recipe was perfect because I had a lone sweet potato left over from last week and instead of whole milk (which we don't buy) I used low fat buttermilk left over from my Christmas baking. I've never made homemade biscuits before so thanks for the great instructions!
i only had almond milk on hand and they still worked out perfectly! just ate one and these were fantastic
so i accidentally made a low-fat version of these...forgot the butter in the freezer and used 1% instead of whole milk BUT they still taste AMAZING!!!
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