Saint-Germain-des-Pres Onion Biscuits

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Lovely little recipe this week for French Fridays with Dorie!

As I was reading through the recipe for Saint-Germain-des-Pres Onion Biscuits from Around My French Table I was reminded of a recipe that I received at an event about pairing bourbon with food.  Onion Walnut Muffins were one of the first of many treats we received from one of our rock star chefs here in the Bluegrass, Ouita Michael.  The recipe she shared with us dated back to the 1700s and bears a lot of resemblance to Dorie's recipe.

I loved the recipe shared that day and loved this one too.  Of course anything that includes caramelized onions makes me deliriously happy.  These little gems were wonderful warm from the oven, the next day as a snack, plain, or with some local pecan honey.  A keeper of a recipe!

I invite to visit French Fridays with Dorie to see what other members of our group thought of this recipe.

Saint-Germain-des-Pres Onion Biscuits Around My French Table, Dorie Greenspan

6 1/2 tablespoons cold unsalted butter
1 small onion, peeled, trimmed, and finely diced (about 1/2 cup)
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
2 teaspoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup cold whole milk

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.  Have a biscuit or deep cookie cutter, one that's between 1 and 2 inches in diameter, at hand.

Put 1/2 tablespoon of the butter in a small skillet or saucepan and cut the remaining 6 tablespoons butter into 12 pieces.

Set the pan over low heat, melt the butter, and add the onion.  Cook, stirring, just until it softens, about 3 minutes.  Pull the pan from the heat.

Put the flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt into a mixing bowl and whisk the ingredients to combine.  Drop the butter pieces into the bowl and, using your fingers, rub the butter into the flour mixture until you've got a bowl full of flour-covered pieces, some small and flakey and some the size of peas.

Scatter the cooked onions over the mixture, then pour over the cold milk and, using a fork, toss and turn everything together until you've got a soft dough.  If there are some dry bits at the bottom of the bowl, reach in and knead the dough gently a couple of times.

Lightly dust a work surface with flour, turn the dough out, and dust the top of the dough very lightly with flour.  Pat the dough down gently with your hands (or roll it out with a pin) until it is about 1/2 inch thick.  It doesn't have to be an even square or round; it doesn't even have to an even 1/2 inch thick.  Just do the best you can and do it quickly.

Dip the biscuit cutter into the flour bin and cut out as many biscuits as you can--cutting the biscuits as close to one another as possible - and transfer the biscuits to the baking sheet, leaving a little space between each one.  Gather the scraps of dough together, pat them down, and cut as many more biscuits as you can; put these on the lined baking sheet too.  

Bake the biscuits for 15 to 18 minutes, or until they are puffed and lightly browned.