Vegan Biscuits

One of our more frequent breakfasts is biscuits. I'm not a big one for biscuits and gravy, but I usually make some gravy for my husband. Me? I'm more of a biscuits and jam kind of girl.

These biscuits are amazingly easy to make. It's a matter of minutes by the time they're in the oven, and then it's a matter of minutes by the time they're out and begging to be eaten. I make them a little thin (perhaps too thin), but they still taste great and my husband has not complained once about them.

Vegan Biscuits
Recipe based upon "Never Fail Biscuits" from AllRecipes.com

• 2 cups flour (I usually do one cup white and one cup whole wheat)
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 4 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
• 2 tsp. white sugar
• 1/2 cup butter, chilled and diced
• 3/4 cup milk

Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.

In a large bowl, sift together dry ingredients. Cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse oatmeal. Make a well in the center of the dry mixture and pour in the milk. Stir until dough begins to pull together then turn out onto a lightly floured surface.

Press dough together and then roll out until 3/4 inch thick. Cut into 2 inch round biscuits and place on an ungreased baking sheet.

Bake in preheated oven for 10 minutes, or until golden.

After I've taken these bad boys out of the oven I drape a kitchen towel over a bowl, and then put the biscuits in the bowl and cover them with the sides of the towel. This allows them to stay warm all during the meal.

One of my favorite ways of eating these is to just put a little butter one of them (although if you look at the amount of butter in the recipe, it truly isn't necessary), and then smear some fruit jam on it. Heaven. Just perfect. Some excellent jams would be orange marmalade or raspberry jam. In this particular batch I used black currant jam which was also very good.

One of my favorite ways of eating biscuits (or really just basic bread) came from my childhood. I remember many breakfasts at my grandparents' house where my grandma would make biscuits, and my grandpa would spread some molasses and butter mixture on them. At the time I don't think I appreciated it very much, but lately I've occasionally eaten my biscuits or bread in a very similar way. These days I am too lazy (or impatient) to take the time to mix the molasses and butter together, so I spread my biscuit with a little butter and then carefully (molasses isn't always slow!) pour some on top. Mmmmm...