I still remember the first time I had a strawberry shortcake. I was about 6 or 7 years old, and we took a family trip up to Maine. I think my grandparents and uncle were visiting from the Philippines, so we took a little road trip up and rented a house for a few days. I remember eating giant lobsters that we’d buy fresh, cook at home, and all enjoy in the little vacation house. And for dessert, my parents pulled out some fresh strawberries, mini shortcakes perfectly shaped to hold the filling, and a can of that good, good Reddi-Wip. I think I loved the whole DIY aspect of this dessert experience and the spray noise of Reddi-Wip always makes my mouth water immediately (even today, though I’ve now learned how to make homemade whipped cream that I think I actually like better! Keep reading for more on that). After that, I remember requesting strawberry shortcake any time I was asked what I’d like for dessert or what my favorite dessert was.

It’s still one of my favorite desserts, and can be so refreshing in the summertime. So seeing as it’s now mid-July and we’ve got the AC cranking at full blast, this seemed like the perfect treat for this weekend’s baking project. I found this recipe for strawberry bourbon shortcakes from another one of my favorite recipe blogs, Half Baked Harvest. The recipe seemed easy enough and so delicious except for one ingredient: bourbon. I’m nearly 7-months pregnant, so I just left out the bourbon from the strawberry topping recipe since we’re really only macerating them so we wouldn’t be cooking out any of the alcohol.

Side note: Did you catch that fancy new culinary term I learned today? Macerate. It really just means that you toss the berries in a sugary mixture and allow them to sit for a while to release the juices. Turns out I’ve been macerating in quite a few of the recipes I’ve been trying out for this blog!

Anyway, back to the recipe. I also love that this recipe puts a twist on the shortcake in that it’s not even a shortcake at all! We’re going to be setting the strawberries & cream on top of a light, buttery biscuit. I don’t think I would’ve really thought about doing it this way, but the photos looked beautiful, so that was enough to convince me! I’ve also never really made a biscuit before, so was excited to check that off my list of “things to try and bake.” Before we jump into the process, I should mention that I halved the recipe since it’s only me and my husband, and no one person needs 4 servings of strawberry shortcake biscuits, no matter how good they are! Alright, so here we go…

First, I got some more use out of my new food processor and tried out the grating function. I cannot believe how easy this made grating the butter. From tons of British Bake Off marathons and YouTube videos of Paul Hollywood’s “cheat’s puff pastry,” I know that using cold grated butter allows you to get butter throughout your dough and melt into the dough during the baking process to really get that buttery pastry. But I’ve never actually tried this, and the thought of grating butter has kind of turned me off from this method. I think I’ve just been afraid that the butter would completely melt in my hand while I was grating it.

Well, no excuses now because I’ve got a game changer: grating via a food processor. This thing grated that butter so fast that there was no opportunity for it to even melt. Honestly, it was so fast it was almost unsatisfying. I pulled out the whole giant food processor from the cupboard, and I was done with it in a matter of seconds! But, whatever, I could get past that for not having melted butter dripping all over my hands. That trade-off is pretty huge to me. Work smarter, not harder (or messier), right?

Then, I mixed my grated butter together with the flour and baking powder, added in buttermilk and honey, and kneaded it for a bit with my hands until it came together into a dough. Once it formed a dough, I rolled it out into a rectangle about 1-inch thick and cut it into 4 pieces. Then I transferred it onto a prepared baking sheet, brushed it with some more buttermilk and sprinkled some coarse sugar on top. Next, just pop those biscuits into the oven and bake at 400F for 15-20 minutes or until golden brown.

While the biscuits were baking, I macerated my strawberries. Basically, I just tossed my strawberries with some honey and sugar and let it sit until I was ready to assemble my biscuit cakes.

While the strawberries sat, I made the whipped cream. I’ve been watching a few homemade whipped cream recipe technique videos the past week, and have been finding that many bakers use mascarpone to get a very creamy whipped cream. I had been wanting to try this, so was excited this recipe actually called for it! It still blows my mind how easy it is to make whipped cream. I also thought adding in mascarpone would make it more complicated, but nope… you just whip it all together with the heavy cream until you get stiff peaks, and you’re done! The mascarpone really makes the stiff peaks something else too! I was never usually quite sure that my peaks were stiff enough when I was just using the heavy cream & sugar, but with the mascarpone, you will know for sure. The peaks kept their form, and it still tasted just as light and fluffy. I also loved how this recipe only used honey to sweeten the cream rather than sugar. Made me feel a little bit healthier, though I did add a teaspoon of vanilla extract.

The biscuits were ready soon after I was done making the whipped cream. I let them cool for a bit on a wire rack, then cut them in half horizontally and started the final assembly.

Just take the bottom halves of your biscuits, add a couple dollops of whipped cream, spoon some strawberries on top, then finish off with the top half of your biscuit, or enjoy open faced!

A few more steps than my original strawberry shortcake experience, but equally as satisfying and delicious!