My first blog post!

Biscuits in Basel

Yum, let's eat!

Happy New Year! Welcome to the first post from Biscuits in Basel. I moved to Basel,Switzerland just over a year ago from New York City. Although Nikhil and I are doing our best to soak up the newness of our surroundings, the comforts of home sometimes call.

So, about these biscuits...Biscuits are one of my favorite foods and come in all forms. I've made drop biscuits, 7-up and BisQuick ones, but nothing beats a leavened, layered buttermilk biscuit. Living in a place where groceries can be a bit confusing (more on that later), I had to learn which flour, butter and buttermilk would work the best. Traditionally, I used King Arthur Perfect Pastry Flour (lower protein for tender biscuits and pancakes), and Marburger Farm Buttermilk (simply the best I've ever cooked with). Well, Toto, we are in Basel; so here is what I've done:

• Flour: Type 405 (analogous to pastry flour) See more here
• Butter: The European butter game is pretty tight, but I had to learn my metric conversions
• Buttermilk: Although I brought KAF buttermilk powder with me, I've been using Meuller Buttermilk

The recipe is a modification of a recipe from Smitten Kitchen. My modifications include:

• Grating frozen butter into the dry ingredients, an old pastry chef trick
• Brushing with melted salted honey butter (2 tbl butter, 1 tbl honey, pinch of salt)

The rise created from the leavening agents and released steam from the melting butter is amazing. If you make larger one, you can make killer breakfast sammies:

Images of roadtrips past.

Thanks, Angelly for the name and stay tuned for more highlights.

Enjoy!!!!!