1 ¼sticks of chilled, cubed butter (10 tablespoons)
¾cupsof buttermilk
2tablespoonscourse decorating sugar, optional
Vanilla Whipping Cream
1cupchilled whipping cream
1teaspoonvanilla extract
¼cupsugar
Instructions
Heat oven to 375 degrees.
Slice strawberries and add to small mixing bowl. Add sugar, balsamic vinegar and pepper. Gently stir strawberry mixture until ingredients are thoroughly incorporated. Set aside for at least 30 minutes so strawberries macerate.
Sift flour, sugar, baking powder and salt into the bowl of a food processor. Add chilled, cubed butter. Pulse on and off until mixture looks a bit like rice. If you do not have a food processor, use your hands to “cut” the butter into the flour mixture by pinching the butter and flour in your fingers.
When the flour mixture looks like rice, transfer to a mixing bowl. Add buttermilk to the flour mixture and stir until dough is just mixed. There may be lose bits of flour on the bottom of the bowl. Using your hands, form a ball of dough. You can squish the lose bits into the ball of dough. Transfer the dough ball to a lightly floured work surface.
Cut the dough ball into four pieces. These look like big triangles. Cut the four triangles in half. You should now have eight pieces. Please refer to the pictures above to see how the dough pieces should look. Once you have eight even pieces of dough, for each piece into a 3-inch circle that is about ½ inch thick. Place these circles of dough onto a parchment paper lined baking sheet.
If you have course decorating sugar, sprinkle sugar on top of each round of dough.
Place baking sheet with buttermilk dough circles into the oven and bake for 20 minutes.
While the dough is baking and strawberries are macerating, whip up the vanilla whipping cream by adding chilled whipping cream, vanilla extract and sugar to a mixing bowl. Mix on high speed for about two minutes until the mixture can form peaks when you lift the mixing blades.
When the biscuits are done let cool for 5 minutes or so until they are lukewarm. Top each lukewarm biscuit with the strawberry/balsamic mixture and vanilla whipped cream. Serve!!
Notes
If the biscuits become too cold, they can be rewarmed in a 350-degree oven for about 5 minutes.When I served these, I left everything deconstructed and let my guests make their own Super-Duper Strawberry Shortcakes with Balsamic. I had the vanilla whipped cream, the strawberry mixture and biscuits all in separate bowls. The guests enjoyed making their own desserts.