Learn to make a few puff pastry-style “turns” of this super simple dough, and you’ll know how to make gluten free biscuits with layers and layers. You’ll never want to make them any other way.
We have made a ton of gluten free pastry here on the blog, from flaky pie crust and authentic puff pastry to biscuits and gravy and 20-minute drop biscuits. But until now, we’ve never done a deep dive on the blog about how to make gluten free biscuits that are as layered and flaky as a Sunday is long (too much?).
The secrets 🤐 to layered and flaky gluten free biscuits
If you want to make flaky pastry of any kind, besides using the exact ingredients specified in the recipe, measured most accurately (usually by weight), focus your attention on temperature and architecture. The cold temperature of the solid fat (butter) is most important, and the way of shaping the dough creates the right structure.
Keep it all cold ❄️
In every single recipe for any sort of traditional gluten free pastry in any of my cookbooks and here on the blog, all of the ingredients must be as cold as possible without being frozen at the start of the recipe.
In baking powder biscuits, the chemical leaveners help create lift. But the layers themselves that appear in any sort of flaky pastry are created when the high heat of the oven hits cold packets of butter that are surrounded by layers of dry ingredients (like flour).
The butter should be cold so that it rapidly releases steam when it reaches that heat. The other ingredients must also be cold (I’ve even refrigerated my whisked dry ingredients before proceeding with the recipe if I really want to ensure mile-high biscuits) so they don’t melt the butter before its time.
Many pastry recipes are made in the food processor or with a pastry cutter with the goal of making the butter into the size of peas, covered in flour. I used to make pastry that way, too. Sometimes it worked, and sometimes it failed to create layers and lift.
Using larger chunks of butter, flattened quickly between your thumb and forefinger once the butter is added to the flour mixture, allows for more manipulation of the dough (see the discussion below of the “turns”). And it’s the manipulation of the dough with your hands, but without melting the butter completely, that creates those flaky layers.
Working quickly, make the “turns” ⏎
The layers in pastry are created by sprinkling the dough with extra flour, then rolling the dough and folding it repeatedly. Each additional turn creates layers that increase in multiples. The greater the number of pockets of butter surrounded by flour, all tightly contained in a single buttermilk biscuit, the greater the layering in the final pastry.
When you’re making traditional puff pastry, you begin with a large, square packet of cold butter that is enclosed in dough, then rolled and folded repeatedly. Each time you roll and fold the dough, it’s considered one “turn” of the dough. In between each turn, you must chill the dough. The process is simple, but laborious. 👩🍳
Here, we begin with lots of cold chunked butter that has been scattered throughout the dough. If we work quickly, we can complete 4 turns before the butter really begins to melt.
Of course, you can chill the dough at any time if you are concerned that the butter is beginning to melt. Since we are working with larger chunks of butter, rather than pea-sized pieces, even if the butter does begin to melt, it will resolidify when chilled the moment the premature melting begins.
Begin with a wet dough 💧
When I’m making a pie crust, I’m looking for a light crust that bakes up browned and flaky, but I’m not looking for multiple layers. Since I don’t plan to work the dough nearly as much as I do with puff pastry or layered buttermilk biscuits, I find that I need to add very little additional flour during shaping.
But when making these layered buttermilk biscuits, I like to begin with a relatively wet dough (the proportions in the recipe as written creates a shaggy, wet dough). That way, I can coat my hands in flour and sprinkle the dough somewhat often with additional flour as I complete the turns—all without drying out the dough which will create flat, crumbly biscuits.
Be sure you don’t replace the buttermilk with anything that isn’t at least the same thickness as a prepared buttermilk. If you use 1 cup of milk that you’ve “soured” by simply adding an acid like lemon juice, your “buttermilk” replacement will be too thin and the resulting dough way too soft and wet.
Cut sharp edges 🔪
The final secret to creating high-rising, layered biscuits is to cut very sharp edges on your pastries. That means flouring your biscuit or cookie cutter, and pressing down swiftly on the dough with the cutter and removing the dough from the cutter right away.
If you prefer to make a different shape to your biscuit, be sure to use a sharp edge to create the shapes. A metal bench scraper makes nice, clean cuts. So does a very sharp chef’s knife.
Ingredients and substitutions
The main additional allergen in this recipe is dairy, and it comes in 3 forms (butter, buttermilk, and nonfat dry milk). Here are my suggestions for how to replace all 3 of them, but remember that the more substitutions you make, the further away from the original recipe you will be.
Dairy/Butter: The butter is the most important ingredient in this recipe, and anyone who is dairy-free knows that there is no perfect substitute. However, if you do need to replace it, try using Spectrum butter-flavored nonhydrogenated vegetable shortening as a gram for gram replacement.
Since shortening is missing the moisture that butter itself has, you will likely need to add a bit more moisture to the dough to get that initial shaggy texture in your biscuit dough. You can actually use very cold water by the teaspoonful until you reach the proper texture.
Dairy/Buttermilk: In place of dairy buttermilk, mix 1/2 cup (by volume) plain nondairy yogurt with 1/2 cup (4 fluid ounces) unsweetened nondairy milk.
Dairy/Nonfat dry milk: In place of nonfat dry milk, you can use coconut milk powder. I really like Native Forest brand. You can also try using finely ground blanched almond flour (not almond meal) in place of the dry milk. I have had success with a substitution like that in the past.
Corn: In place of cornstarch, you can use arrowroot. If you’re okay with corn and dairy, you can use 2 cups (280 g) Cup4Cup gluten free flour blend (or my mock Cup4Cup or Better Than Cup4Cup blend) in place of the flour blend, xanthan gum, dry milk powder, and cornstarch.
HELLO! I’m Nicole! I make gluten-free food enjoyable & affordable. If they can make it with gluten, we can make it without. That’s a promise!
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Thank you, thank you for this biscuit recipe. I have been baking gluten free for ten years now and tried countless biscuits. This one is hands down the very best. I just ate two for breakfasts and there’s no funny aftertaste. I have all of your books and use them religiously. Keep up the good work.
L. K. Stroter
I’m so glad, Lillian! A good biscuit recipe is actually really important. It ticks so many boxes, you know?
Love your books. They have been a lifesaver since my husband was diagnosed with celiac three years ago. I wonder about the sugar in the recipe. We really don’t like sweetness in our bread or biscuits. When I’ve made you r flakey biscuits before they were really good, but didn’t get the lift I used to get with delicate handling t gluten dough. I did cut the sugar in half after trying them once.
Is the sugar important to the rising in away I’m not knowing?
The sugar is included in a very small amount, Martha, and doesn’t make these biscuits sweet at all. If you didn’t get flaky layers, I’m afraid I really can’t know where you deviated from the recipe other than the sugar since I’m not there with you but I’d always look first at any substitutions you may have made, whether you used one of my recommended flour blends, measured by weight instead of volume, etc.
Nicole,
In your recipes , can I use Cup for Cup for the flour? I have used them in the past in your recipes and it didn’t come out like yours.
I have never seen better batter in the stores. Do you have to order it online?
I have always used the Cup for Cup to sub flour in any family recipes. Things come out great, and its easy to get, it’s available in ShopRite and Target super convenient. But I’m not sure it’s good in your recipes. What do you think?
Pam
Hi, Pam, Cup4Cup is really a pastry flour. It will work quite well in this recipe as a substitute for the flour, milk powder, and cornstarch (gram for gram). It doesn’t work in every recipe (it’s particularly poor in chewy bread recipes) because it’s very high in starch. Please see my Gluten Free Flour Blends page (linked in the recipe) for full information on flour blends.
In the video you didn’t add the dry milk powder, cornstarch and xanthan gum.
It’s all in the “GF Flour,” Terri. It’s really a pastry flour blend that I use. Trust me it’s all in there!
I made these biscuits for dinner tonight with beef stew and they are the best biscuits I’ve ever made and so easy!! Thanks Nicole
That’s so great to hear, Judy! Once the dough is shaped and cut, they freeze great and can be baked right from frozen. I always have biscuits in the freezer ready in a pinch!
Oh my, these look great. I do my regular biscuits by folding the dough and using cold ingredients. I will have to try these for our great granddaughter.
I hope she loves them, Charlotte!
Nicole, the video is for coconut cupcakes, not biscuits.
Oh my gosh, Annie, it has the right introductory thumbnail, but the wrong video! I’ve fixed it now. Thank you for pointing that out! If you still see the old video playing, try clearing your browser’s cache and it should be there. So sorry about the issue, and thanks again for pointing that out.
Nicole You are the best! I have bought all of your books and look forward to the Sunday weekly recipe.. I have been gluten free since 2007. I have a rare inherited form of ALS. It is not life threatening but it is aggravated by gluten. My tremors increase when I eat gluten. I am now 74 and have told people I am in the best shape I have been in my entire life due to going gluten free and it is due to your fabulous recipes making my life better. I do not feel deprived or like I am missing out on things.. I do not know how you get your inspiration to create the things that you do but sending a lot of love and a big Thank you for making my life and others so much better.
Oh, wow, Janet, thank you for taking the time to leave such a kind comment. I’m so honored to have been able to help you feel more capable of taking care of yourself, even though my help is in a very small way and you’re doing the heavy lifting. I had never heard of a gluten free diet’s being helpful for ALS in any form, but nothing about the interaction of diet and health really surprises me anymore. Whenever a doctor tells me that anything is entirely unrelated to diet, I nod and smile—and know it can’t be true. How could it be? Cheers to never having to feel deprived!
Well you certainly have been keeping me busy these days Nicole. Each time you post a recipe, I find myself running to the kitchen to see if I can ‘give it a try’. I’ve been avoiding pastry for a long time, but these extra flaky biscuits called out loud to me and today was the day to roll and fold. I went to about 6 folds as the first couple of rounds were a bit sticky on my board (maybe the powdered, re-constituted buttermilk? because who has buttermilk on hand), but the results were great! They were a bit higher than your video, ergo 6 folds, but oh my gosh, DELICIOUS! and light! You really are the best GF reference on the internet!
Thank you so much for letting me know, Milvi! I’m thrilled that you’ve been so game to try new recipes, and that means that I’m doing my job properly, at least some of the time. 🙃
Cindy, I need to be dairy free too (except we use butter) so PLEASE report back exactly what you used and how it all turned out. Thank you so much!
If you can use butter, Holly, I highly recommend that you do that. No butter substitute, not even the shortening that I recommend as a butter substitute, will perform exactly as when you make the recipe as written. The buttermilk can be made dairy free as I describe in the Ingredients and substitutions section, if you can’t have regular buttermilk.
Can you do this dairy free???
Please see the “Ingredients and substitutions” section at the bottom of the post, Mar, for all the information I can provide on making this recipe dairy-free.
I can’t wait to try this! How large should the chunks of butter be. I normally cut each tablespoon into four pieces. I will be using the dairy subs.
I highly recommend that you use shortening, not a vegan butter, Cindy, as described in the Ingredients and substitutions section. That won’t be in a stick, so you’ll have to approximate the size of the pieces I use in the video.
Hello Nicole
I would please like to get some of your gluten free recipes.I have IBS and have been eating gluten free and has helped so much.Always looking for more ideas.
Thanks
Nicole Bickford
Thanks for all you do! I make many of your recipes for my son who has celiac disease. I was hoping to watch this video to see exactly how you handle the dough – I probably over handle it, but I can’t find the video. Did the link not get put in or am I missing it?
Hi, Sheri, if you’re using an ad blocker, you won’t see the video. Otherwise, on desktop it plays automatically (without sound) and on a mobile device it’ll be right above the recipe, and you just click the ▶️button in the center of the horizontal photo.