Strawberry Shortcake🍓

Strawberry Shortcake is one of my favorite desserts! With this recipe you get a flaky, buttery biscuit with a strawberry filled center, and finally topped with fluffy whipped cream. Everything about this dessert is great because it’s a perfect balance of fruity flavor without being overly sweet.

While I think this is a perfect spring/summer dessert, I truly believe it’s great all year round because most of us have access to strawberries all year round. Not only that but light and fruity desserts are always in season if you ask me!

Why I love Strawberry Shortcake and this recipe:

You can make the biscuits ahead and assemble them at a different time with fresh strawberries and whipped cream.
This is a great buffet style dessert. You can lay all the ingredients out and others can assemble their Strawberry Shortcakes to their preferences.
It’s a great light and fluffy dessert that doesn’t require a gallon of cold milk from too much sweetness.

Tips for making the best Strawberry Shortcakes:

Make the strawberries first. Give your strawberries time to release juices while you work on making the biscuits. You will thank me when you have strawberry juice seep through your biscuits!
Use cold butter chunks. You don’t want to melt the butter in your dough for the biscuits so you want to make sure that the butter is cold, that way, it doesn’t melt as quickly when you work it in the dry ingredients. You also want to leave small chunks of butter in the dough. This is what makes the biscuits flaky and soft.
Use buttermilk. The acidity in the buttermilk will activate the baking soda. If you don’t have buttermilk, you can make your own.
- To make your own butter milk, in a measuring cup, add 1 tablespoon of vinegar or lemon juice. Then, add whole milk until you get to the one cup mark. Let the milk sit for 5 minutes. Mix it and you have yourself buttermilk. The acid from the lemon of vinegar will curdle the milk, leaving you with buttermilk.
Do not over mix the butter in the dry ingredients. I’m saying this again because it’s that important! You should see small pea-sized chunks of butter throughout the dough.
Sift the dry ingredients. Sifting will make a softer and more even biscuits.
Don’t forget to cool the dough before baking it! This will ensure that the butter does not melt! Notice I’m talking about not melting the butter… again…. 🙂 Trust me, I’ve made bad biscuits and I want you to learn from my mistakes!
When assembling, make sure that the biscuits are cooled completely before adding strawberries and whipped cream. You don’t want the whipped cream to melt.
Use home made whipped cream (which is just whipping up with heavy cream and some vanilla and sugar). This will be more flavorful and your whipped cream will hold up much better then store bought whipped cream.
Don’t roll out the dough too flat. The dough should be about a quarter of an inch thick. If your dough is too flat, you will be left with a flat and denser biscuit. Although the biscuits will rise, You con’t want to flatten all the buttery and flaky layers.

You can make this into a sundae!

Yes- I’m serious! You will just need a deeper dish so it doesn’t get messy. Simply break apart the biscuit, place it i the bottom of the bowl, add ice cream, strawberries, and whipped cream. I’m not kidding when I say that this is incredibly flavorful! I have tried and it it tastes much better than store bought. You can get creative and add sprinkles, extra strawberry sauce, and anything else that your heart desires.

Can I freeze the strawberry shortcakes?

You can freeze just the biscuits on their own but not assembled. Strawberries will release a lot of liquid when thawed and the whipped cream will not hold well.

To freeze the biscuits, wrap them with plastic wrap and store in freezer bag for up to 3 months.

This makes it a perfect make ahead dessert because you can freeze the biscuits ahead of time and prepare the whipped cream and strawberries fresh because they don’t require a long time.

Makes 9 Biscuits
Biscuits:
•2 1/4 cups flour
•2 1/2 tsp baking powder
•1/2 tsp baking soda
•3 Tbs sugar
•1 cup buttermilk
•1 tsp vanilla extract
•1/4 tsp salt
•5 Tbs butter, cold and cubed
•1 egg for egg wash
•1 Tbs sugar to sprinkle on top of biscuits

Strawberries:
•1 3/4 lbs diced strawberries
•4 Tbs granulated sugar
•1 1/2 tsp lemon juice, optional

Whipped cream:
•1 1/4 cup whipping cream
•2 Tbs sugar
•1 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:

1. Begin with the strawberries. Dice the strawberries, sprinkle them with sugar, add lemon juice and refrigerate them covered with plastic wrap.

2. In the mixing bowl, fitted with a paddle attachment, add the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, sugar and butter, mix until the butter is well distributed with the dry ingredients but do not over mix. There should still be small chunks of butter.

3. Add in the buttermilk, continue to mix until your dough comes together.

4. Dump the dough on clean, floured surface and flatten the dough in a 3/4 inch thick rectangle. Fold down the middle and flatten again. Do this 4 times.

5. Cover with plastic wrap and place them in the fridge for 30 minutes.

6. Preheat oven to 400°F.

7. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.

8. After the biscuit have been cooled for 30 minutes, place the on the baking sheet and brush the biscuits with egg wash. Then, sprinkle them with sugar, and place them in the oven for about 17 minutes or until golden.

9. One the biscuits are done, remove them and place them on a cooling rack to cool completely.

10. In a separate bowl, using a handheld electric whisk, whip the heavy cream, sugar, and vanilla until semi still peaks form.

11. Once the biscuits have cooled completely, assemble your shortcake and enjoy.