I have been so excited to share this recipe with you all!  It was a present for my dad so I had to wait until now to post it here.

This year, to celebrate Christmas my family decided to give gifts of time and knowledge rather than physical presents.  For example, my sister taught me how to put on eye makeup and I helped her define what she wants to be when she grows up.  My mom gave me some advice on investing and my grandpa gave me book recommendations.

My Parents Christmas Table. How cute are the little nativity candle holders in the background?

My dad and I exchanged recipes.  It was a lot of fun hanging out in the kitchen, talking, and swapping techniques.  Interestingly, we both tend to develop similar techniques seemingly independent of one another.  For example, both of us started working with brining this year and roasting vegetables last year.  What great techniques we should play with this year?

These biscuits are delicious.  They are flaky and buttery with just the lightest hint of sweet which makes them taste more like Pillsbury biscuits with a texture that is 100 times better.  How wrong is that?!?  What I really wanted my homemade biscuits to taste like are the ones out of the can.  I will say, I have really happy memories from college around those Pillsbury biscuits so lets blame it on nostalgia and never speak of this again.

See the problem with round biscuits? Wasted biscuit dough. I really encourage rectangle biscuits.

Biscuits

Adapted from The Lee Bros. Southern Cookbook .

2 1/4 cups sifted cake flour

1 Tbs baking powder

1 Tbs + 1 tsp sugar

1 tsp salt

4 Tbs unsalted butter

2 Tbs lard

1/4 cup whole buttermilk

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees

Mix the dry ingredients.

Add butter and lard and mix to course crumbs with a few pea size chunks.  You can use a food processor, forks, or a pastry blender.  I like the pastry blender best.

Pour the buttermilk over the mixture and mix until the dough just comes together.

Flour a surface.

Turn dough onto the floured surface and pat into a 1 inch thick rectangle.

Fold rightmost third of dough into center.  Fold leftmost third on top.  Pat into a 1 inch thick rectangle.

Repeat.

Cut into 9 rectangular biscuits.

Place onto an un-greased cookie sheet and bake for 15-20 minutes, until tops are golden brown.