The Toothpick Trick That Ensures Tall And Flaky Homemade Biscuits

For many home bakers, making fluffy biscuits can be tricky. While you might have followed your recipe to the letter, getting the perfect results can be about more than using ultra-cold butter and incorporating it into the flour (don't forget to use unsalted butter, by the way). Once you've formed the dough and cut out the individual biscuits, you can use a simple toothpick to get picture-ready biscuits. It's as simple as poking a few of the tiny wooden skewers into each biscuit before baking them off in the oven.

To use this easy tip, think of it like doweling a cake, which usually calls for inserting rods into said cake for stability. Try to press the toothpicks all the way to the bottom of the biscuit dough, so that the toothpick extends through each biscuit and touches the baking sheet below. Aim to use at least two, if not three toothpicks per biscuit, too. This will help ensure that your biscuits turn out perfectly fluffy and uniformly shaped.

If you're wondering why this easy trick makes biscuits seem fluffier, it's because the toothpicks allow the biscuits to rise more successfully. Instead of the biscuits puffing out to the sides or toppling over, they rise straight and tall. This is what gives the biscuits a seemingly lighter texture and a uniform appearance thanks to the upright rise. This is likely because the toothpicks give the steam created in the baking biscuits a direct path to follow out of the dough. Instead of the water escaping wherever it can, the water molecules from the butter can condense and cling to the toothpick as it travels out of the dough as steam.

So, the next time you want to make biscuits that are tall and fluffy as well as flaky, thanks to the layers of butter cut into the dough, try pressing a few toothpicks into each one before baking. Don't forget to avoid 15 of the biggest mistakes people often make with biscuits — which include using a dull biscuit cutter and not using enough fat. With these tips, you'll have golden brown biscuits ready to serve up in no time.