Spelt Biscuits

There is nothing better than a hearty, soul warming soup in the fall and through the winter, but as excited as I am about tasting each new batch or being reminded of familiar favorites, sometimes I get just as excited about the bread that will be accompanying it.

I made a big batch of stew for dinner the other night soon after finishing our chickpea noodle soup. Normally I enjoy soups and stews with a nice loaf of crusty bread; sopping up all the last remaining bits with a shaggy torn piece at the end. This time however, I was craving biscuits. Warm from the oven, flaky, buttery, homey biscuits.

Now, these are not your traditional biscuits in any sense, they are made entirely from spelt flour, but they still have that buttery, slightly flaky characteristic I was craving. So they suited me just fine.

This batch made plenty more than we could eat that night and biscuits are always a welcome sight in the morning. I rewarmed them slightly in the oven the next day just to give them that warm from the oven feel again. Then I drizzled mine with some local raw blackberry honey alongside a hot cup of tea, but jam or even just a nob of butter perks them up too. I also may have eaten more then one, but who's counting?

Now that I'm on the topic of breakfast, I'm envisioning serving these alongside scrambled eggs or tofu or maybe making a fried egg sandwich from them as well. Biscuits have so many great uses! Never be afraid to make a double batch, they will always get eaten.

Other than the change from white flour to spelt (you can use light spelt if you prefer too), there is plenty of cold butter mixed in to give the biscuits their flakiness. I used my favorite buttermilk substitute of almond milk and vinegar, but if you have a splash of buttermilk needing to be used up you can use that here too.

Spelt Biscuits
8-10 biscuits

3/4 cup almond milk
1 teaspoon vinegar
2 1/2 Cups spelt flour
1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into cubes

Preheat the oven to 350˚F.

In a small bowl or liquid measuring cup, combine the milk and vinegar (alternatively you can use buttermilk), set aside.

Sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Using your hands, rub in the butter into the flour mixture until you have roughly little pea size bits.

Stir in the milk mixture with a wooden spoon. You should have a shaggy doughy mess, don't worry if it seems dry at this point. Dump everything out onto a clean surface and knead the dough 10-15 times just until all the flour is worked in.

Flatten the dough out into a 1" thick circle and use a biscuit cutter to make neat rounds of dough. Gather together any remaining dough scraps and repeat until you have 8-10 biscuits cut out. Place them on a baking pan and bake for 18-20 minutes. Serve warm.