Buttermilk Biscuit dough in advance?

[roux42]

Can I make it tonight and bake the biscuits tomorrow? Any good ideas for a quick and easy recipe? I am having people over for dinner, but one of the couples is staying with us and are going to show up around 11:00am and I do not want to spend the day in the kitchen.

[Ali]

I'm pretty sure I remember seeing Ina Garten do biscuit/savoury scones the night before for a breakfast party, so do a search for that. I haven't personally tried the reciped, but the few items I've tried from Ina Garten have all worked well, especially baking items (where I'm vaguely more interested in following a recipe).

On the other hand, biscuit dough takes about 10 minutes (max) to pull together, especially if you're willing to do drop biscuits instead of the rolled-out, cut-out biscuits (and especially if you're willing to use a chemical leavener instead of yeast). Takes no time to come together if you take the tip from visciole and mix dry good ahead of time. I perfected my biscuits with Crisco, so I hesitate to offer it, but whatever recipe you use, it should take no time to put together if you're willing to add an extra 10 minutes to your prep time.

[pcdarnell]

You can make them, but don't bake them. Freeze them on a cookie sheet, then when frozen put them in a freezer bag and keep them frozen until you are ready to cook them. That way you can make them in advance of a party, or just have them available to cook one or two at a time.

[Uncle Bob]

You can make them in 20 minutes (or less) start to finish including clean up and have them in the oven....What's the rush? Anyway...as stated it want work...unless ya wanna serve hard tack.

[visciole]

Nope, you can't. You can, however, mix the dry ingredients, cut the fat into them, and then add the liquid right before you want to bake them.

I like "The Joy of Cooking" biscuit recipe with buttermilk, can't recall the exact name of the recipe, but my book is several decades old so I'm not sure if the recipe is the same. In any case buttermilk biscuits are pretty basic and probably any recipe from a reputable source would work well.

[todao]

I agree. You could freeze the dough but you're using baking powder (aren't you) and not yeast so you'll loose a lot of the leavening power if you mix all the ingredients ahead of time. Mix the dry, add the wet just before you want to load them into the oven - don't over mix.

[amokscience]

Refer to this: http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/461660