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Sweet Potato Biscuits

These tips will help you turn out great biscuits. Keeping the fats cold gives the biscuits flakiness.

Handling the dough as little as possible ensures the biscuits will be tender. Some recipes call for

gathering and rerolling scraps, which can lead to tough biscuits; cutting rectangular biscuits is a

clever way to avoid this, as rectangles leave no scraps. Cutting the biscuits with a straight-down

motion produces an even shape, and baking them at high heat results in biscuits that rise high and

brown handsomely.

The sweet potato can be baked 1 day ahead and kept at room temperature. The dry and wet

mixtures can be prepared several hours in advance, but do not combine them until you are ready to

bake. The honey butter can be prepared several days ahead and refrigerated.

1 sweet potato

1 1/4 cups buttermilk

2 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

1 cup cake flour

5 tsp. baking powder

4 tsp. sugar

3/4 tsp. salt

2/3 cup cold solid vegetable shortening, cut into

small pieces

4 Tbs. (1/2 stick) cold unsalted butter, cut into

small pieces

For the honey butter:

12 Tbs. (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room

temperature

1/3 cup honey

Preheat an oven to 400°F.

Prick the sweet potato several times with a fork. Place it directly on the oven rack and bake until

very tender, about 1 1/4 hours. Let cool completely.

Position a rack in the upper third of the oven and increase the oven temperature to 450°F. Peel the

sweet potato and force it through the medium disk of a food mill or a large-mesh sieve into a bowl.

Add the buttermilk and whisk until smooth.

In a large bowl, sift together the all-purpose flour, cake flour, baking powder, sugar and salt. Add

the shortening and butter and, using a pastry blender, cut them into the dry ingredients until the

pieces of fat resemble corn kernels. Add the buttermilk mixture and stir until a soft, crumbly dough

forms. Turn the dough out onto a well-floured surface and knead 8 to 10 times, until it just holds

together.

Roll out and pat the dough into a rectangle 6 by 12 inches. Using a knife or cookie cutter, cut the

dough into 12 rectangular biscuits. Transfer the biscuits to an ungreased insulated baking sheet or

doubled regular baking sheet. Bake until the biscuits have risen and their edges and bottoms are

lightly browned, 12 to 14 minutes.

Meanwhile, make the honey butter. In a small bowl, stir together the butter and honey until light

and fluffy. Serve the biscuits hot, accompanied with the honey butter. Makes 12 biscuits.

Adapted from Williams-Sonoma Collection Series,Thanksgiving,by Michael McLaughlin (Simon &

Schuster, 2001).