Pancake Mix Biscuits
These pancake mix biscuits are an easy shortcut recipe made with simple pantry ingredients to create soft, fluffy biscuits without traditional biscuit dough. Perfect for quick breakfasts or when you’re out of flour, they bake up light and tender with minimal effort.
Recipe Highlights
- How they turn out: These pancake mix biscuits are soft, fluffy, and surprisingly similar to traditional homemade biscuits despite using pancake mix as a shortcut. If you’re out of flour or simply want an easier way to make biscuits, this recipe delivers tender, buttery biscuits with minimal ingredients and effort.
- Skill level: This is a beginner-friendly biscuit recipe because the pancake mix already contains many of the dry ingredients normally measured separately. The most important step is working the butter into the mix properly to create a light, fluffy texture.
- Storing:These pancake mix biscuits store well in both the refrigerator and freezer. Make a batch ahead of time and simply reheat them when you’re ready to serve for a quick breakfast or easy side dish.
Why pancake mix works for biscuits
Pancake mix works surprisingly well for biscuits because it already contains the basic ingredients found in traditional biscuit recipes, including flour, leavening, and salt. Instead of measuring several dry ingredients separately, you can use pancake mix as a shortcut while still creating soft, fluffy biscuits.
The key difference comes from adding cold butter and milk. These ingredients help create the tender texture and flaky layers people expect from homemade biscuits while keeping the recipe simple and beginner-friendly.
Ingredient tips
- Pancake mix: Complete pancake mix works best for this recipe because it already contains the leavening and ingredients needed to help the biscuits rise properly. Most major brands will work, although the final texture may vary slightly depending on the mix you use.
- Milk: Milk adds moisture and helps bring the dough together. Whole milk will produce the richest biscuits, but other varieties can be used if that’s what you have available.
- Butter: Cold butter is the key to soft, fluffy biscuits. As the butter melts during baking, it creates small pockets throughout the dough that help produce a light texture. For the best results, avoid substituting margarine.
Chef’s tips
- The same rules apply to this recipe as any other biscuit recipe. Do not over-mix the dough! You bring the dough to the point where it’s just combined then you stop and cut out the pancake mix biscuits.
- You can mash in the butter with the flour but I find grating slightly frozen butter makes the recipe super easy. Simply place the butter in the freezer for 10 minutes then grate into the pancake mix and make the biscuits.
- Pay attention to how to cut the biscuits. I’d recommend a biscuit cutter or a drinking glass works wonders but press and do not twist. You also don’t want them super thick because there is plenty of leavening agent in pancake mix and they are going to rise.
How To Make Pancake Mix Biscuits
- Preheat the oven to 400F.
- In a large bowl, add the pancake mix. Then, grate the butter into the pancake mix then simply toss the pancake mix and the butter then is no need for smashing. However, you can add pieces of cold butter and use a pastry cutter to bring everything together.
- Now, add in the milk, stir and bring the dough together. Then, lightly flour a surface and place the dough down. Flatten the dough with a floured rolling pin or by hand until it’s about 1-1.5 inches thick. Cut out the biscuits with a biscuit or circle cookie cutter.
- Place the biscuits on a lined sheet pan and bake 10-12 minutes depending on your personal oven. Biscuits are done when they have risen and are golden brown. Brush with butter when you pull them from the oven. Serve biscuits after they cooled for 5 minutes and enjoy.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Can you use any pancake mix to make biscuits?
Yes, but complete pancake mixes work best because they already contain the leavening and other ingredients needed to help the biscuits rise properly. Brands may produce slightly different textures, but most complete pancake mixes can be used successfully in this recipe.
Why are my pancake mix biscuits dense?
Dense biscuits are usually caused by overmixing the dough or using warm butter. For the softest texture, mix only until the ingredients come together and use cold butter when preparing the dough.
Can you add ingredients to pancake mix biscuits?
Absolutely. Shredded cheese, garlic powder, herbs, cooked bacon, or green onions can all be mixed into the dough to create different biscuit flavors while keeping the same basic recipe.
Can you freeze pancake mix biscuits?
You can freeze these biscuits like any other. Allow them to cool completely then you can pop them in a ziplock bag or freezer-safe container and store them in the freezer.
How to reheat biscuits?
You can reheat these biscuits in the microwave, oven or the air fryer.
More recipes using pancake mix
Easy biscuit recipes to try next
- Blueberry Butter Swim Biscuits
- Garlic Parmesan Butter Swim Biscuits
- Cheddar Bay Butter Swim Biscuits
- Pancake Mix Sausage Balls
- Honey Butter Swim Biscuits
- Strawberry Biscuits
- Blueberry Biscuits
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Pancake Mix Biscuits
Ingredients
- 2.25 cup pancake mix
- 3/4 cup milk
- 6 tablespoon butter grated
- 1 tablespoon butter melted for brushing
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400℉.
- In a large bowl, add the pancake mix. Then, grate the butter into the pancake mix then simply toss the pancake mix and the butter then is no need for smashing. However, you can add pieces of cold butter and use a pastry cutter to bring everything together.
- Now, add in the milk, stir and bring the dough together. Then, lightly flour a surface and place the dough down. Flatten the dough with a floured rolling pin or by hand until it's about 1-1.5 inches thick. Cut out the biscuits with a biscuit or circle cookie cutter. Note, you may need to add more milk if you see too much pancake mix not forming into the dough. Add about 1TB extra at a time.
- Place the biscuits on a lined sheet pan and bake 10-12 minutes depending on your personal oven. Biscuits are done when they have risen and are golden brown. Brush with butter when you pull them from the oven. Serve biscuits after they cooled for 5 minutes and enjoy.
good recipe