How to Make Homemade Biscuits From Scratch
Three ingredients. A few minutes of your morning. And a biscuit so good it’ll make you wonder why you ever bought them frozen.
Do you remember the last time you had a really good homemade biscuit — the kind that is soft as a pillow with a perfectly crisp, buttery crust?
I raised my family on these biscuits. Five kids, 23 years of homeschooling, more meals than I can count — and this recipe was there through all of it. It’s so good and so simple to make, really only taking a few minutes to prepare, which is exactly why it became a staple instead of a special occasion.
I remember many years ago, deciding that I was going to cook a hot breakfast for my family every day. My son didn’t particularly like cereals, and I knew that homemade biscuits took less than 20 minutes from start to finish. So easy, but also worth the little bit of extra effort.
Biscuits have long been a part of my family’s history and there’s just nothing like a homemade biscuit.
When my husband’s grandmother was raising her family, every morning she would get up at 4am and start making breakfast. They lived in a big farmhouse in Bluefield, Virginia. Grandma Ringstaff would get the biscuit dough ready, and she would sit down at the kitchen table and wait. And when she heard the pitter patter of feet (she knew exactly who was who by the sound of their feet on the floorboards), she would put a biscuit in the oven so it would be hot and ready when they came down the stairs to the kitchen.
When my mom’s daddy asked her mama to marry him, he said, “How would you like to make biscuits for me every morning?” Mama Elsie’s wooden biscuit bowl now sit on my mama’s kitchen counter and has been there for decades.
When my parents got married, my daddy’s mama (my Granny) taught my mama how to make her famous Cathead Biscuits (a.k.a. pinch biscuits) and I grew up eating homemade biscuits for breakfast or lunch or supper. She had a special biscuit bowl for her biscuits – it was a large yellow Tupperware bowl with a snap-on lid. She kept her self-rising flour in it. She would mix up the dough with her fingers and pinch off each biscuit to be cooked in her cast iron skillet. Our entire family swoons over my mama’s biscuits.
related: Homemaker’s Kitchen Favorites
For a long time, I didn’t have a biscuit bowl to make Cathead biscuits, and over the years, I ended up perfecting my own recipe for From Scratch Biscuits. Although my mom gave me her biscuit bowl last year, I’ve been working on perfecting her recipe too.
Here’s a picture of my daddy eating some of my biscuits along with some homemade peach jam last November (2025).
Homemade Biscuits From Scratch
If you’ve been looking for a recipe worth passing down, this is it. These biscuits have the perfect crisp bottom with light and fluffy layers.
Ingredients
Just three simple ingredients — nothing fancy, nothing you don’t already have on hand:
- 2 1/2 cups self-rising flour
- 1 stick of cold butter
- 1 cup of milk
How to Make Homemade Biscuits
Preheat your oven to 450°.
Start by cutting the cold butter into the flour until the mixture looks like coarse crumbs. Then pour in the milk and gently stir until it’s just combined — resist the urge to overmix.
Turn the dough out onto a floured surface. Pat it down to about 1/2-inch thickness, fold it over, and gently pat down again. Repeat this a couple of times. This is the part where patience pays off — be very gentle when handling the dough. The less you fuss with it, the more tender your biscuits will be.
While your dough rests, add 2 tablespoons of butter to a cast iron skillet and melt it in the oven, watching closely so it doesn’t burn. If you don’t have a cast iron skillet, a buttered baking sheet works just fine, but cast iron is by far the best way to cook a homemade biscuit.
Cut out your biscuits, pressing the cutter straight down without twisting, then pulling straight back up. That little detail matters more than you’d think — twisting seals the edges and keeps your biscuits from rising as tall as they should.
Place your biscuits in the preheated skillet or on your baking sheet and bake at 450°F for 10-12 minutes, until golden on top. Brush with a little extra butter when they come out, if you like.
How We Always Eat Them
Warm, always warm, with a pat of butter and homemade jam or a drizzle of honey. They’re perfect alongside your favorite gravy for a proper country breakfast. I raised my kids on tomato gravy, milk gravy, sausage gravy, and brown gravy. All of them are good on these biscuits – but tomato gravy is my favorite.
And if there happen to be leftovers — my favorite way to eat them the next day is with a thick slice of tomato in the middle.
Biscuits aren’t just for breakfast. They perfectly accompany just about any meal and we love to have them for supper! Simple, satisfying, and perfect for any meal. That’s really the whole philosophy behind a good homemade biscuit, isn’t it?
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From Scratch, Homemade Biscuits
"The three-ingredient biscuit that raised my family — flaky, buttery, and on the table in minutes. No fuss, no fancy tools, just cold butter and a gentle hand."
Ingredients
- 2 1/2 cups self-rising flour
- 1 stick of cold butter
- 1 cup of milk
Instructions
Preheat your oven to 450°.
Start by cutting the cold butter into the flour until the mixture looks like coarse crumbs. Then pour in the milk and gently stir until it’s just combined — resist the urge to overmix.
Turn the dough out onto a floured surface. Pat it down to about 1/2-inch thickness, fold it over, and gently pat down again. Repeat this a couple of times. This is the part where patience pays off — be very gentle when handling the dough. The less you fuss with it, the more tender your biscuits will be.
While your dough rests, add 2 tablespoons of butter to a cast iron skillet and melt it in the oven, watching closely so it doesn’t burn. If you don’t have a cast iron skillet, a buttered baking sheet works just fine, but cast iron is by far the best way to cook a homemade biscuit.
Cut out your biscuits, pressing the cutter straight down without twisting, then pulling straight back up. That little detail matters more than you’d think — twisting seals the edges and keeps your biscuits from rising as tall as they should.
Place your biscuits in the preheated skillet or on your baking sheet and bake at 450°F for 10-12 minutes, until golden on top. Brush with a little extra butter when they come out, if you like.
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Nutrition Information:
Yield:
7Serving Size:
1Amount Per Serving: Calories: 357Total Fat: 3gSaturated Fat: 2gUnsaturated Fat: 2gCholesterol: 7mgSodium: 33mgCarbohydrates: 70gFiber: 2gSugar: 0gProtein: 10g
