Baking SOS: How to fix 10 common biscuit problems by Jo Wheatley (2024)

FAQs

Why are my biscuits soft and not crunchy? ›

To prepare crunchy biscuits, reduce the amount of ingredients that tend to retain moisture, such as 00 type flour, eggs or brown sugar. Prefer white granulated sugar or corn syrup instead, for drier biscuits.

If your biscuits are falling apart…

If this sounds familiar, you could be adding too much flour to your dough without knowing it, disrupting the ratio of dry to wet ingredients.

But if you chill your pan of biscuits in the fridge before baking, not only will the gluten relax (yielding more tender biscuits), the butter will harden up. And the longer it takes the butter to melt as the biscuits bake, the more chance they have to rise high and maintain their shape. So, chill... and chill.

The best way to make soft biscuits crispy again is to put them in the oven at a low temperature (200–250°F) for about 10 minutes. The heat will help dry out the moisture in the biscuits, making them crispy again. There are a few ways to make soft biscuits crispy again.

The easiest way to retain the freshness and texture of cookies and biscuits is by storing them in an airtight container and keeping them at a cool and dry place like a pantry.

The butter version rises the highest — look at those flaky layers! The shortening biscuit is slightly shorter and a bit drier, too. Butter contains a bit of water, which helps create steam and gives baked goods a boost.

A hot oven helps biscuits bake—and rise—quickly. We recommend 475˚F for 15 minutes.

Heavy cream provides rich butterfat that gives the biscuits tenderness and flavor, as well as moisture from its water content. The formula requires minimal mixing, reducing the risk of too much gluten development.

Buttermilk also adds a pleasant tanginess to baked biscuits, and its relatively low levels of fat make it work in recipes that call for any kind of fat, from butter to shortening, and even cream. (Yes, cream can be used as both a liquid and a fat.

Do you flip biscuits when baking? ›

The biscuits take about 14 to 16 minutes of baking. You can rotate them after about 8 minutes to get a more even bake. Keep a close eye on them, they should be pale to golden brown in color. Remove from the oven and serve warm.

Turn the dough out onto a well-floured surface and pat it down into a rough rectangle, about an inch thick. Fold it over and gently pat it down again. Repeat two more times. Cover the dough loosely with a kitchen towel and allow it to rest for 30 minutes.

As the biscuits sit around, even in a tin, the sugar absorbs moisture from the air. Leave sugar in a bowl in the tropics, for example, and it will absorb so much water it will eventually turn into a liquid! As the sugar in the biscuit absorbs more moisture, it becomes softer and softer and less and less appetising.

Store In Airtight Container

When biscuits are kept in open space, they absorb moisture and thus become soft. This is why if you have an open packet of biscuits, ensure to store it in an airtight container. This will keep the moisture away and maintain the crispiness of the biscuits.

Problem eight: Once cooled, if I know my biscuits are underbaked can I put them back in the oven? Jo's solution: You can. Also, if you don't eat shortbread within a few days and they go soft, you can refresh them in the oven, too.