Easiest Parmesan Biscuits

5 signs I am getting older, acting older

• I gravitate to the easiest recipes (like these amazing Parmesan biscuits), the quickest recipes, the one pot ones, the pressure cooker ones. The baklavas, the opera cakes, adhirasams remain on the to-try list.
• I stop opening forwarded messages. I have no respectable profile pictures to update. I lose faith in the ‘like’ system and I have absolutely zero interest in selfies.

• A cookbook and amrutanjan (pain balm) are always under my pillow. I haven’t read a book without ingredient lists and cooking techniques in ages.
  
• I start telling myself that cakes ought to look like cakes and not so life like. I catch myself thinking - Instead of a barbie cake, why not a simple rosette cake and an actual barbie? Instead of a whiskey bottle cake, why not an undecorated rustic tiramisu loaded with rum? All this may have something to do with the fact that I am as good at cake decorating as at making small talk (no good) and gaping at the unbelievably stunning cakes on Home Baker’s guild and reality finally checking in.
• I order hot coffee at coffee shops and never cold coffee anymore. Invariably I have a headache too. I need a hot coffee and preferably an aspirin as well.
• When my friends suggest going out for New Year’s eve I say “None of these loud new year bashes. Somewhere quiet, away from the crowd and preferably early evening so that I can get back home for dinner”.

I’ve got more than 5 here. I must be getting older than I think.

But these Parmesan biscuits are easier than you think. These Parmesan biscuits just melt in the mouth and it is hard to believe they’re so easy.  They’re perfect as a snack or as party nibbles. What made them easier than the original recipe was that I forgot the eggs that had to be added. Another sign there.

I made eggless Parmesan biscuits thanks to my absent mindedness. They were harder to cut out into proper shapes as you can see. I made rustic roundish biscuits by pinching a marble sized ball of dough and then simple flattening it out with my hands and pressing down with the back of a fork for some pattern.  I loved the biscuits. Hasini loved them. Yuvi loved them. My dad loved them. 4 of us agreed on it. That’s like full house in our house. You bet they were good. Go ahead, make them today! Or maybe tomorrow if you’re having a headache. But make them soon.

Prep time: 20 mins

Baking time: 20-25 mins

Makes: 50-60 biscuits

Ingredients

All Purpose flour/Maida – 1-1/2 cups

Grated Parmesan Cheese – 200 gm

Cold butter cut into cubes – 8 tbsp

Salt – ¼ tsp

Milk – 3-4 tbsp (adjust as necessary to make a dough)

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees centigrade. Grease a couple of baking sheets.
2. Take flour in a large bowl. Dump the butter on to the flour and use your fingers to cut the butter into the flour rubbing them between your fingers. Continue until you see no pieces of butter. The flour butter mixture will resemble the texture of wet sand at the end of it.
3. Now throw in the grated cheese and mix with the flour mixture till it is evenly distributed.
4. Add milk one tbsp. at a time to bring the mixture together into a dough. Knead lightly to a dough, shape into a log and chill for 30 minutes.
5. If your dough is manageable, you can use a knife to cut very thin slices of the dough and then place them on a greased baking sheet. Use the back of a fork to press into the slices to make a pretty pattern. If you’re not able to cut slices off the dough, simply pinch small balls of dough, place them on baking sheet and flatten them into thin discs with your hands. Use the back of a fork to press into the disc.
6. Place the baking sheets in the middle rack of the oven and bake for 20 – 25 minutes or till the underside is slightly browned. Remove from oven. Let the biscuits cool down. Shake the baking sheet to loosen the biscuits from the sheet. Enjoy. Store in an air-tight box for up to a week.