Biscuit Croutons Will Add A Buttery Crunch To Your Soups

Four buttermilk biscuits on board
Four buttermilk biscuits on board - Rudisill/Getty Images

Biscuits are fluffy, buttery, and utterly decadent quick bread rolls that accompany breakfast, lunch, or dinner, but they go stale after sitting in the breadbox or fridge for too long. Instead of throwing them away, you can do with stale biscuits what you'd do with any other type of stale bread: Make croutons!

At first glance, biscuits are less-likely candidates for croutons because they get denser and heavier as they grow stale instead of drying out like most bread types. This is due to a comparably high fat content from ingredients like butter, shortening, or lard. A high fat content actually works in a crouton's favor, though, providing a comforting and rich taste while precluding the need for the added oils and seasonings normally used to flavor conventional croutons.

All you need for tasty, buttery biscuit croutons are the biscuits themselves cut into bite-sized pieces. A short stint in the oven will transform them from dense and hard to crunchy, light garnishes that upgrade your favorite soups. Toasting them in this way will also revive their flavor, highlighting the buttery richness they're famous for and ridding them of an unpleasantly stale aftertaste.

Read more: 20 Popular Canned Soups, Ranked Worst To Best

Flavor Pairings For Biscuit Croutons

Bowl of French onion soup
Bowl of French onion soup - Lauripatterson/Getty Images

Biscuit croutons will add a buttery crunch that's welcome atop a broad range of soup recipes, enriching lighter brothy soups and standing up to richer, creamier soups. Draw inspiration from popular biscuit dishes and recipes as well as common soup and sandwich pairings. For example, topping a bowl of creamy potato soup with bacon bits and biscuit croutons would emulate the Southern classic, biscuits and gravy.

If you have cheddar cheese biscuit croutons, they'd make the perfect garnish for a bowl of tomato soup instead of a classic grilled cheese. You could also add shredded cheddar to your bowl of tomato soup before topping it with plain biscuit croutons. Biscuit croutons would make a wonderful swap for classic croutons to top French onion soup, their buttery flavor complementing the richness of melted Gruyère cheese and caramelized onions.

Soups aren't the only dishes that could benefit from biscuit croutons. Imagine a take on a fried chicken biscuit sandwich where you use biscuit croutons atop a club salad with breaded fried chicken tenders and honey mustard. They'd also taste great over a Cobb salad with ranch or blue cheese dressing. You could even adapt biscuit croutons for a dessert à la strawberry shortcake by crumbling biscuit croutons over vanilla ice cream and strawberry compote. There's no shortage of clever ways to extend a biscuit's shelf life and utility!

Read the original article on Tasting Table.