Biscuits Lab321 recipes

Biscuits Lab · Calculator

Design your own biscuits

The sliders start at the typical batch: the median of 321 recipes for each ingredient, in grams per 100 g of flour. Move any of them within the range that 90% of recipes use (the 5th to the 95th percentile) and the grams update, with where your choice sits among the recipes and what that ingredient does.

This scales ratios; it is not a tested recipe. Each ingredient moves on its own against the flour, and a combination no recipe uses may not bake the way you expect. For the method, pan and oven, follow the real recipes nearest your numbers.

Flour

300 g, about 2 1/3 cups, makes one typical batch.

Start from a recipe

Grams per 100 g of flour

  1. 120 g · 41%about 1/2 cup

    In the middle: 48% of recipes use more, 51% less.

    Cold butter or shortening cut into the flour melts in the oven into steam pockets, which are the flaky layers.

  2. 250 g · 84%about 1 cup

    In the middle: 50% of recipes use more, 49% less.

    Buttermilk hydrates the dough and supplies the acid for baking soda. Wetter doughs rise taller and softer.

  3. 15 g · 5.1%

    In the middle: 49% of recipes use more, 49% less.

    Biscuits rely almost entirely on baking powder and soda; that is why they carry several times a cake's share.

  4. 10 g · 3.2%about 2 1/3 tsp

    In the middle: 50% of recipes use more, 48% less.

    Southern biscuits use little or none. Above this band the recipe is closer to a scone or a cookie.

  5. 5 g · 1.6%

    In the middle: 46% of recipes use more, 48% less.

    Salt is most of the flavor in a plain biscuit.

Your biscuits

Your biscuits in grams, with approximate volumes
IngredientGrams
Flour300 gabout 2 1/3 cups
Fatbutter, oil and shortening120 gabout 1/2 cup
Buttermilkmilk, buttermilk, yogurt, cream and water250 gabout 1 cup
Leaveningbaking soda and baking powder15 g
Sugarwhite sugar, brown sugar, honey and syrups10 gabout 2 1/3 tsp
Salt5 g
Total700 g

700 g in all from 300 g of flour, counting only the groups above.

Closest real recipe: Cheddar Sage Biscuits (twopeasandtheirpod.com).

BakeThe median of 300 recipes is 425°F (220°C), most for 13 to 18 minutes at their own size. A bigger or smaller batch, or a different pan, changes the time.

The 3 real recipes nearest your numbers

Measured on fat, buttermilk, leavening, sugar and salt at once. These are published, tested recipes: follow one for its method, pan and timing, or load its percentages and adjust from there.

  1. 1

    Cheddar Sage Biscuits · twopeasandtheirpod.com

    fat 40% · buttermilk 87% · leavening 5.7% · sugar 3% · salt 1.6%

  2. 2

    Homemade Biscuits (Popular Recipe!) · sallysbakingaddiction.com

    fat 36% · buttermilk 88% · leavening 5.4% · sugar 4.5% · salt 1.9%

  3. 3

    Homemade Cheddar Biscuits · sallysbakingaddiction.com

    fat 36% · buttermilk 88% · leavening 5.4% · sugar 4.5% · salt 1.9%

How the calculator works

Every recipe is reduced to baker's percentages: grams of each ingredient group per 100 g of flour. The starting point is the median of all 321 recipes for each group separately, so no single recipe is exactly the starting batch. Grams are your flour weight times each percentage, rounded to the nearest 5 g above 50 g and the nearest gram or half gram below.

“More than 80% of recipes” counts the recipes with strictly less of that ingredient per gram of flour. The nearest recipes are measured on every ingredient at once, each scaled by how much recipes vary on it, so a wide-ranging ingredient does not outweigh a narrow one.

Only the groups listed are counted. Vanilla, spices, mix-ins and toppings are left out unless they have their own slider. Volumes are approximate: flour at 125 g a cup, sugar 200 g, butter or oil 225 g, milk and other liquids 240 g.