Sourdough Discard Biscuits, Camp Oven
Discard, flour, butter. Dropped into a covered pot and baked over coals.
- calories
- 230
- weight
- 2.6 oz
- cal / oz
- 88
- protein
- 4 g
- serves
- 8, scales
- prep
- 10 min
- cook
- 20 min
- total time
- 30 min
- water
- none
- cost
- $
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Breakfast
- Dutch oven
- Campfire coals
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Vegetarian
- Nut free
- Real dishes
- Pre-mix at home
- Needs a cooler
- Actual cooking
Ingredients
| All-purpose flour | 2 cups | whole wheat or spelt works, expect denser biscuits |
|---|---|---|
| Baking powder | 1 tbsp | the discard is flavor, not lift |
| Salt | 1 tsp | |
| Unsalted butter | 6 tbsp | cold, cut into cubes |
| Sourdough discard | 1 cup | straight from the jar, unfed is fine |
Method
- Build a fire early and let it burn down. You want coals, not flame. Start the dutch oven heating on a few of them.
- Mix the flour, baking powder, and salt in the pot lid or a bowl.
- Cut the cold butter into the flour with two knives or your fingers until the biggest pieces are pea-sized. Work fast so it stays cold.
- Pour in the discard and stir until it just holds together. It will be shaggy. Stop there.
- Drop eight rough spoonfuls into the greased dutch oven, leaving space between them. No rolling, no cutting.
- Lid on. Set the oven on a thin bed of coals and shovel more coals across the lid, roughly twice as many on top as underneath.
- Bake 18 to 22 minutes. Rotate the oven a quarter turn and the lid the opposite way twice during the bake or one side burns.
- Lift the lid away from you so ash falls outside the pot. Biscuits are done when the tops are set and dry.
This one keeps its butter and its live starter, so it stays a car-camping and basecamp recipe. Sourdough discard is half flour and half water by weight, which is why the flour here is dry-measured and no additional water goes in. Nothing to reconstitute at camp.
The baking powder does the rising. Unfed discard has no reliable leavening left in it, and there is no overnight proof out here anyway, so it contributes tang and moisture only. Cold butter is the other half of the structure: the cubes melt during the bake, leave gaps, and those gaps are what makes the crumb flaky. Warm butter smears into the flour and you get a scone. Drop biscuits instead of cut rounds because a floured board is one more thing to carry and wash. Coal placement matters more than time. Most of the heat has to come from the lid or the bottoms scorch before the tops set.
Packing
Whisk the flour, baking powder, and salt at home and carry it in one bag. The butter and the discard jar both ride in the cooler; the discard jar needs a lid that actually seals, because it will keep working and push gas.
Variations
- Grated hard cheese and cracked pepper stirred into the dry mix.
- No dutch oven: fry the same dough as thick pancakes in a covered skillet, five minutes a side over low coals.
- Out of discard, use 1 cup of buttermilk powder reconstituted to the same thickness. You lose the tang.
https://dontwastethecrumbs.com/buttery-sourdough-biscuits-recipe