Kefir Drop Biscuits

Before there was baking powder commercially available, many traditional households clabbered milk, or "soured" it to use in griddle cakes and other common recipes. So often you see traditional foods that call for sour milk, because it makes use of something that presumably would have been wasted.

Another good reason being, sour milk clabber, or buttermilk reacts with baking soda. Many of us remember science class volcanos, when the baking soda hits the acidity, poof! The leavening magic happens. Eventually the short cut we know as baking powder was created to replace the necessity of keeping soured or fermented dairy on hand. In our household we typically have raw homemade kefir around though, and its truly my favorite for making whole grain biscuits especially. 

 These baking soda biscuits are easy to prepare with a few great quality ingredients, for the fluffiest results use mostly sifted or all purpose flour. A combination of whole wheat and sifted can be used also.

(100% Spelt or Einkorn also work very well in this recipe! )

This recipe makes about twelve generous sized biscuits. These are my favorites for shortcakes, or simple breakfasts. We love a good biscuits and gravy, but these are also pretty epic with a gob of butter and some homemade jam~!

- You can add herbs, berries, or lots of cheese if you'd like. If you add wetter berries, or frozen berries especially, reduce your liquid by about 1/4 cup. 

Dry Ingredients 

• 4 Cups Flour
• 2 teaspoons sea salt
• 2 teaspoons Baking soda
• 8 Tablespoons of Butter, cut into small pieces

Wet Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cup milk or water 
• 1/2 cup whole milk kefir 
• 1 egg
• 3 tablespoons honey

Mix together your wet ingredients until they are combined and set them aside. In a bowl combine your dry ingredients. Add the cubed butter. Combine with your fingertips or a fork , until the mixture is somewhat uniform and looks like "wet sand." Slowly add the liquid . Do not over mix. Dollop even , generous sized dollops onto a greased baking sheet (about 1/3 cup each) and  Bake at 450°F 15 minutes, or until they are golden brown. 

NOTE: Kefir really acts different than buttermilk ( or soured milk or yogurt) in baking recipes because it naturally contains yeasts, which brings even more lift to whatever recipe you are making. If you don't have kefir on hand, feel free to use 2 cups of buttermilk in place of the kefir and water, or sour some milk yourself  by adding a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar to 2 cups of whole milk.

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 By Cat Morrow www.LegacyAcres.org