Cheesy Beer Biscuits are an easy ‘quick bread’ recipe with olive oil, herbs, cheese and beer, which aerates the dough, making them light and fluffy.
What Is An American Biscuit?
In America and Canada, a biscuit is a flour-based bread, leavened with baking soda, instead of yeast and is considered a ‘quick-bread’!
The texture of a biscuit is often a firm exterior with a soft, crumbly interior. This texture that lends itself to spread things on, like a Homemade Marmalade, Onion Jam or Hummus, and perfect for dunking in a soup, stew or chili.
For this reason, I will often bake my biscuit recipe on top of a stew, as a Pot Pie, to cover it and present it with a pastry-like topping.
Ingredients Of The American Biscuit
Most of our biscuits are made from a flour of your choosing, and some type of fat; butter, vegetable shortening or lard.
The liquid in our biscuits is often milk, cream or buttermilk.
These beer biscuits are perfect to serve with a bowl of soup or chili in the winter months or great with a salad.
What Is A British Biscuit?
In the UK, biscuits are totally another story. Having married a Brit, I realized we often spoke different languages!
He speaks British while I speak American, and while both are English, we often have no idea what the other is talking about. LOL!
A biscuit in the UK is actually (to us Americans), a cookie! Any variety of cookies that are made with flour, sugar, some type of fat and a leavening agent, usually baking soda.
The most common biscuit (cookie), is the shortbread cookie, made with lots of butter and perfect for afternoon tea.
Biscuits Made With Beer
Since a biscuit is often a rather dense dough on the inside, I found that adding beer to my dough instead of milk, makes them lighter and fluffy.
Perhaps the yeast aspect in beer causes the biscuit dough to expand a bit, therefore making them rise taller when baking.
The carbonation aspect of beer, aerates the dough, making it lighter and fluffier. This also works well when making a beer batter for frying foods; making for a lighter, crispier texture.
Bread vs Biscuits
In the dead of a cold winter, I find myself making lots of soups, stews and chili dishes. While they seem the perfect warm bowl of food for winter nights, sometimes I just want to dress them up with something special on the side.
For my winter bowls, I like to make bread; of which you will see on my blog that I have a huge variety of homemade yeast breads.
- Tea Bread – Actually made from butterfly tea flowers, beautiful and delicate in flavor.
- Beetroot Spinach Bread – Another beautiful yet most nutritious bread with beetroots and spinach.
- Homemade Yeast Bread – The basic dough for many of my yeast breads.
Cheesy Beer Biscuits Instead Of Yeast Bread
The dilemma with yeast breads, if you don’t plan ahead to make them, is the time it takes to rise, then bake.
One evening, when I knew we would be having leftover soup, I wanted something quick to make my leftovers feel special. This recipe for a cheesy beer biscuit just popped into my head.
Instead of butter, I used olive oil, and instead of milk I used beer. The cheese melted beautifully while baking and quite honestly, I could have just eaten the biscuits alone.
To bring a richer element to the recipe, I caramelized an onion in a small pat of butter, and added fresh rosemary to the onions.
You see? Wouldn’t you just as soon eat the biscuit and forget the soup!
Forming The Beer Biscuits
Since the dough has been aerated with the beer, the dough is not dense enough to roll out and press, as you would butter biscuits, like the biscuits I made for a pot pie.
And so there are two ways to form these biscuits; in a cupcake/muffin tin or placing a rustic dollop on a baking sheet and baking them free-form.
If you want the biscuits to be firm enough for dunking, then I would suggest forming them.
But is you want to place dollops of the dough on top of a stew or chili and bake them in the oven that way, free-form is great.
Equipment Needed
- Small sauté pan – to caramelize the onion
- Measuring cup
- Measuring spoons
- Cupcake/muffin pan – if you want the biscuits formed
- Sheet pan with parchment paper – if you want the biscuits free-formed
- Ice cream scooper
- Cutting board
- Knife
- Whisk
- Stovetop
- Oven
Ingredients Needed
- Onion
- Butter
- Rosemary or other herb
- Eggs
- Olive oil
- All purpose flour
- Spelt flour
- Salt
- Baking powder
- Baking soda
- Beer
- Cheese
Cheesy Beer Biscuits
Ingredients
- Onion – 1, finely chopped
- Butter – 1 tbsp
- Rosemary – 1 tbsp, chopped or other herb
- Eggs – 2
- Olive oil – 1/2 cup
- AP flour – 1 cup (all purpose)
- Spelt flour – 1 cup (or other rustic flour)
- Salt – 1 tsp
- Baking powder – 2 tsp
- Baking soda – 1/2 tsp
- Beer – 10 oz
- Cheese – 1/2 cup, chopped
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350
- In a small saucepan, sauce the finely chopped onion with the butter until caramelized. Add the chopped rosemary and remove from the stove to cool for 5-minutes.
- In a medium size mixing bowl, whisk the eggs with olive oil. Whisk in the onion mixture.
- Whisk in the dry ingredients and while whisking, pour in the beer.
- Place a dollop of the dough into a muffin tin (no need for oil if it is silicone, otherwise lightly spray with oil), on parchment paper lined baking sheet.
- Bake until golden on the tops, about 25 minutes for small biscuits or 30 minutes for larger biscuits.
Video
Notes
Nutrition
I believe the table... that place that draws people to gather, is the most powerful symbol of togetherness. All that happens before the table is set, the planning, the gathering, the preparing, are all an intricate part of the dance that create the mood of celebration to share with friends and loved ones.
