Cheezy Garlic Drop Biscuits

♥ Or the blog post where I fall in love with Nutritional Yeast! ♥

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So, I've added hints of red and hearts to this post as apparently there is some holiday coming up in February that requires me to do so ;-) Not that there is anything particularly romantic about cheezy garlic biscuits but you will fall in love with these!

It's funny sometimes how a recipe develops. I have always loved biscuits, and I am using the American term here, think of a lighter, flakier scone. I already have my basic biscuit recipe, which I love, and I have posted a cheeze and onion version using Cheezly which I also love. Then a friend on facebook posted a recipe to these "Cheddar Bay Biscuits" that you get at Red Lobster chain of restaurants in North America. They looked amazing and as I already love biscuits looked into them further. Turns out they are mega popular with everyone trying to recreate them. Who knew? I've never even been to a Red Lobster!

They are, from what I could see, simply a light and flaky garlic biscuit with a lot of grated cheddar baked in. Of course you could just replace the grated cheddar with your favourite vegan melty cheese: cheezly melty cheddar or daiya but I've been trying to avoid those lately and as a result have been falling in love with nutritional yeast. The other day I made Chloe Coscarelli's Vegan Goldfish Crackers:

Not only are they insanley cute but they tasted so much like the original cheesy goldfish crackers and they get their cheesy flavour from nutritional yeast. My son used to love those and could not tell the difference! As I was so impressed with those I decided to try her Mac and Cheeze, also a nutritional yeast based one:

I have tried many vegan nutritional yeast based mac and cheezes and to be honest I have really liked them all but I think this one is now my favourite.

I then whipped up these Baked Cheeze and Onion Tortilla Chips one evening for a snack, they are crisp, salty and cheezy - the holy trinity of snack foods? Yes. 

So, now that I have established that I really love Nutritional Yeast as a cheezy type flavouring I set about veganizing these cheddar bay biscuits with it. In the end these turned out amazing! They are a combination of my basic biscuit recipe with flavour inspiration from Chloe's Goldfish Crackers and this one for the garlic parsley butter that is brushed on after they are baked. Heavenly.

Cheezy Garlic Drop Biscuits - makes about 18 depending on size.

350g plain flour - 2 1/2 cups

20g nutritional yeast flakes - 1/3 cup

2 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp turmeric

1/4 tsp garlic powder

1/4 tsp onion powder

50g vegan butter - 1/4 cup

50g cold vegetable fat (shortening) - 1/4 cup

350ml cold unsweetened soy milk - 1 1/2 cups

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2 Tbsp vegan butter, melted

1/4 tsp dried parsley

1/2 tsp garlic powder

pinch of salt

Line a baking sheet with baking paper and preheat the oven to 200C/400F. 

Measure the flour and baking powder in a large bowl and mix well. Grind the nutritional yeast in a mortar and pestle so that it is fine and no longer flakes. You can easily do this by hand as well. Mix with the ground flakes the salt, turmeric, garlic powder and onion powder. Set aside.

Add the butter and shortening to the flour and cut in with a pastry cutter (preferable) or with 2 knives or with your hands until you have a crumbly mixture. As the shortening is a lot harder than the butter there should be larger crumbs of it left and the butter as it's softer should look somewhat flaky in there. I prefer to do this part by hand with a pastry cutter as opposed to a food processor as you have more control over how small the crumbs get. You don't want them too fine as it's this that will make the biscuits light and fluffy.

Now stir in the nutritional yeast and seasonings and mix well. Stir in the cold soy milk until well blended - do not over mix. 

Using a tablespoon scoop up some of the mixture and drop onto the baking sheet. It's easiest to use 2 tablespoons here, one to scoop and the other to push it off onto the pan.

Pop into the preheated oven and bake for about 12 - 15 minutes, mine took 12. Rotate the pan halfway through if need be. They should be lightly golden brown and you can do a toothpick test - if it comes out clean with only dry crumbs attached they are done.

Now melt the butter for the glaze and stir in the parsley, garlic powder and a tiny pinch of salt. Mix well and brush this generously over the hot biscuits:

Repeat until they are all done then EAT! These are best warm and you don't need to add any more butter, I just wanted to get my little heart shaped butter dish in the photos ;-)

They are lovely just on their own, with a warming bowl of soup or as a side to any dinner :-)

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Nutritional Information: based on 1 biscuit out of 18

Calories: 127

Fat: 5.5g

Sat Fat: 1.7g

Fibre: 0.8g

Protein: 3.1g

Carbs: 15.8g

Sugar: 0.2g

Sodium: 254mg