Easy Butter Swim Biscuits
Butter swim biscuits are biscuits baked in pan of melted butter. The insides are light and fluffy and the edges are crisp and buttery! YUM!
Want the easiest biscuit of your life? These butter swim biscuits are going to be your new best friend.
They are so quick and simple! And those crisp, buttery edges are definitely something to write home about.
One-Bowl Biscuit Dough
The biscuit dough (almost like a thick batter) for these easy butter swim biscuits is VERY straightforward.
- flour
- tiny bit of sugar
- baking powder + baking soda + salt
- buttermilk
I promise I didn’t leave out an integral biscuit ingredient from that list. If you’re wondering what happened to the butter, stick with me for a minute.
There’s no butter in the actual biscuit dough for these swim biscuits. The butter comes later!
Making Butter Swim Biscuits
These biscuits are aptly named “swim biscuits” because the simple batter literally swims in a pan of butter.
As you press the batter into an even layer, it’s ok, and actually preferable, for the butter to push up and over the batter to pool around the sides and across the top.
Why Cutting Through the Dough is Important
Take a plastic knife and run through the biscuit dough to make nine squares (like a tic tac toe game).
If you don’t have a plastic knife, you can use another knife or a bench scraper.
The dough is very sticky, so you won’t get completely clean cuts. That’s ok!
The point of running a knife through the dough is to mark cuts so that the biscuits easily separate into squares after they are baked. This also helps the butter infiltrate all the nooks and crannies of the biscuit dough for a maximum buttery effect on every biscuit.
Bake Until Golden
The biscuits need a higher oven temperature in order to bake correctly.
The edges should be sizzling with butter when pulled out of the oven, and the top and sides of the biscuits should be golden brown.
A lot will depend on the type of pan the biscuits are baked in and the exact oven temperature.
If the biscuits are turning out overly greasy and under baked, increase the oven temperature by 15-25 degrees and/or bake for longer.
Swim Biscuits are Best Served Warm
These biscuits aren’t flaky like a traditional buttermilk biscuit, but they are intensely fluffy.
And the bottom and edges are every so delightfully buttery.
These biscuits are definitely best served right away, piping hot, in order to maximize that buttery goodness.
They fare decently well reheated, but tend to lose a bit of of the sizzle and crisp around the edges and take on a slightly greasier hue (although, it doesn’t stop us from popping them in the microwave for a few seconds and devouring the leftovers).
Easiest Biscuit Recipe
These easy swim biscuits have become our go-to “bread-y” side dish for any number of meals, and they are so easy, my kids can whip them up without my help.
My brother-in-law, Brad, is the one who introduced us to the recipe (sending me a text imploring me to make them right away). He probably doesn’t realize the legacy that has been created with this simple biscuit recipe.
We can devour a pan of these right out of the oven in mere seconds. They are SO good with a tad bit more butter (no judging) and raspberry jam.
We’ll be making these for years to come!
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Four Years Ago: Soft Banana Bread Cookies
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Six Years Ago: Greek Meatball Stuffed Pitas with Easy Tzatziki Sauce
Seven Years Ago: Sesame Chicken Pasta with Thai-Style Peanut Sauce
Eight Years Ago: Delicious Caesar Salad {With Homemade Dressing}
Nine Years Ago: Slow Cooker White Bean Chicken Chili
Ten Years Ago: Hearty Chicken Gnocchi Soup
Butter Swim Biscuits
Ingredients
- ½ cup butter
- 2 ½ cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon granulated sugar
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- 2 cups buttermilk
Instructions
- Cut the butter into pieces and place in an 8X8-inch or 9X9-inch baking pan. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F (or 425 degrees F if using a glass pan, you live at high altitude and/or your oven bakes hot).
- Place the pan with the melted butter in the oven while it preheats to let the butter melt (it will only take a few minutes – watch carefully so the butter doesn't burn). Alternately, you can avoid all the fun and melt the butter in the microwave and spread in the pan.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and baking soda.
- Pour in the buttermilk and stir with a spatula or spoon just until no dry streaks remain – don't over mix!
- Tilt the pan of melted butter so the butter evenly coats the bottom of the pan.
- Dollop the biscuit batter in heaping spoonfuls over the melted butter. Use a spatula to even out the batter. It's ok, and actually preferable, for the butter to pool up, around and on top of the biscuit dough.
- Use a plastic knife (I've found this works best, but you can also use a bench scraper or other knife) to cut through the biscuits to make nine squares. The batter is sticky, so you won't get super clean cuts – that's ok. You just want to mark cuts in the biscuit dough so that the biscuits easily separate into squares after they are baked. This also helps the butter infiltrate all the nooks and crannies of the biscuit dough.
- Place the pan on a larger aluminum-foil covered baking sheet (in case of spillover) and bake for 25-35 minutes until golden around the edges and the middle is baked through. Serve warm!
Notes
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Recipe Source: based off a recipe sent to me by my brother-in-law, Brad (similar to this recipe and this recipe)
These were great! I loved the buttery, crisp top. They were perfect! The recipe was easy and we all love them!
Decided to try this recipe. I gave it a 3 because even following recipe to the T with every ingredient measured the edges and top came out hard and crunchy while the middle was light and fluffy. I followed directions and extended time for 5 minutes because middle was sticky and top was still white. Those 5 minutes did it. I think these will be for biscuit and gravy so they can soften. On to next recipe.
These were amazing! Everyone loved them and my husband took two which never happens.
Made these according to the directions except used 6 Tbls of butter instead of 8. They were crispy on the outside tender inside. Very good.
Easy, quick & oh so good!
I adjusted this slightly to use my sourdough discard. I used one cup of sourdough discard, and decreased the flour by a half cup and decreased buttermilk by a half cup. They turned out a huge hit, and my husband said they were the best thing I’ve ever made across all categories. I also made and served these in my ceramic pie dish for easy and beautiful serving.
I only have an 11×15 dish available right now. I doubled the recipe and it fit perfectly and turned out great. Everyone loved it. This is such a great recipe for quick and easy biscuits.
Without buttermilk my milk with lemon didnotget thick enough. I was rather soupy going into the oven. So much so that it settled under the butter. I didn’t want to add flour so crossing my fingers it works. Will try sour cream or yogurt with milk next time as others have suggested.
Good but to much butter for me.
Can you cut back on the butter in the pan? I see some recipes call for a stick which i’ve tried and way too much. So I tried yours with a 1/2 a stick and is much better. Can you just coat the pan in butter like you would for brownies or cornbread? Or would the biscuits stick? Thank you so much. I really love old fashioned biscuits but i’m getting too tired to do all the folding to make southern biscuits. These are so much quicker and easier.
Hi Joli, decreasing the butter will affect the end result (since there isn’t any butter or oil in the actual biscuit dough) but you can certainly experiment!
Wow, these really are wonderful! The whole family loves them, and I love that they are easy to whip up. 😉 I’ve been doing 1.5x the recipe in a 9×13 as you and some others suggested, and it’s been working out perfectly. Thanks, Mel!
Oh, and I usually don’t have buttermilk in the fridge, but the vinegar/ milk combo works perfectly, as does using 50/50 milk and sour cream (or yogurt). (And one time I did 60/40 milk and yogurt… end of the month/ grocery budget lol! :P)
Absolute perfection. Just the recipe you need when cutting butter into dough is just too tedious.
These biscuits are SO easy and SO delicious. My wife won’t let me make any other kind of biscuits anymore. I make them with powdered buttermilk (just add water). I mix the buttermilk powder in with the other dry ingredients, then just add the appropriate amount of water.