Fresh strawberries and shortcake cream biscuits with chocolate gravy
Instructions:
- Shortcake cream biscuits:
- 11⁄2 cups all-purpose flour;
- 3⁄4 cup cake flour;
- 3 tablespoons granulated sugar;
- 2 teaspoons baking powder;
- 1⁄2 teaspoon kosher salt;
- 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, chilled;
- 1 cup heavy cream, plus more for brushing;
- 4 teaspoons turbinado, demerara, or raw sugar.
- Berries:
- 4 cups capped and sliced strawberries;
- 2 tablespoons granulated sugar.
- Chocolate gravy:
- 1⁄4 cup cocoa powder;
- 1 cup granulated sugar;
- 3 tablespoons instant flour or allpurpose flour;
- 2 cups whole milk;
- 4 tablespoons (1⁄2 stick) butter, cut into 4 pieces.
- For the biscuits:
- Preheat the oven to 400 F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat.
- Whisk together the all-purpose flour, cake flour, granulated sugar, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl. Use a pastry blender or your fingertips to work in the cold butter until the pieces are the size of small peas. Stir in the cream until shaggy dough forms.
- Turn the dough out onto a very lightly floured surface and knead 2 or 3 times, just until it comes together. Roll or pat the dough into a rectangle about 3⁄4-inch thick. Stamp out 5 biscuits with a 3-inch cutter. Press straight down without twisting the cutter so that the biscuits can rise evenly to their full height. Gently gather and roll the scraps of dough and cut out the sixth biscuit. You might have enough scraps for an oddly shaped bonus biscuit.
- Transfer the biscuits to a baking sheet. Brush the tops lightly with cream and sprinkle with the turbinado sugar. Bake until golden, about 25 minutes. Cool to room temperature on a wire rack.
- For the strawberries: Toss the berries with the granulated sugar in a large bowl and set aside for at least 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- For the gravy: Sift the cocoa, granulated sugar, and flour into a large skillet (preferably cast-iron). Slowly add the milk, whisking until smooth. Cook over medium heat, stirring continuously with a heatproof spatula until the gravy thickens to the consistency of thin pudding, about 8 minutes. The gravy will thicken around the edge first, so keep it stirred up from the bottom and sides. Remove the pan from the heat and add the butter one piece at a time, stirring until it melts before adding the next.
- Split the biscuits in half and divide among the serving plates. Top with the berries and their juice. Ladle a generous amount of warm gravy over the top and serve hot.
- Make-ahead note: You can make the shortcake biscuits up to 2 days ahead. Store at room temperature in an airtight container.
- Tips and Techniques. Many biscuit and pie crust recipes say to add cold butter to the dry ingredients. That’s because when the bits of cold butter suspended in the dough go into the hot oven they melt and release steam, which makes biscuits light and pie crust flaky. You can cut the butter into small cubes and chill them, but I prefer to grate the butter on the large holes of a box grater, dipping the end of the stick of butter into the flour occasionally to keep it from sticking and smearing on the grater. The short shards of grated butter blend into the dough quickly, before it has a chance to warm up.