Maple Cinnamon Buttermilk Biscuits

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Loaded with cinnamon chips and brushed with melted maple butter, these tender, flaky buttermilk biscuits are a delicious treat to serve at your next brunch. Served warm and drizzled with homemade maple icing, you won’t know if you’re eating breakfast or dessert.

Back when I use to work in an office full-time, there was this amazing bakery just around the corner from my building. If I was having a particularly rough day (or it was just a random Tuesday) I would take a walk and go on a mission for carbs. Now, I love cookies and sweet treats just as much as the next person but, to be honest, I typically lean more savory when I’m looking for comfort food. For this reason, my go-to bakery treat was always a selection of giant buttermilk biscuits.

Biscuits may be one of my very favorite baked goods. Their flaky, buttery layers, crisp exterior and tender interior are so incredibly satisfying. Whenever I try a new brunch spot, I always make a point to try their biscuits. I’ve found that if a restaurant nails their biscuit recipe, then the rest of their food is usually pretty excellent. 

These biscuits were born out my desired to create a vessel for leftover Easter ham breakfast sandwiches. A plain biscuit would have surely sufficed, but I wanted something a little sweet that would help cut through the salty ham. While these definitely make a killer breakfast sandwich piled high with leftover ham, swiss cheese, cranberry mustard and a fried egg—they’re totally delicious on their own too.

Buttery and flaky like a croissant and full of sweet spice like a cinnamon roll these biscuits are an excellent salty-sweet hybrid. I’ve also served these warm with vanilla ice cream and cinnamon apples—like a shortcake. So good!

Biscuit-making Tips

Over the years, I’ve picked up several tips for making biscuits that help enhance their texture, rise and flavor. Essentially making great biscuits boils down to three main things: ingredient quality, temperature and shaping.

When it comes to ingredients, the foundation of any basic biscuit is simple: flour, butter, leavening agent, sugar, salt and liquid. However, I’ve found it’s important to not take their simplicity for granted. Choosing a high-quality flour and butter makes a big difference in a biscuit’s overall flavor, texture and rise. My motto: if you’re going to eat butter-ladened biscuits do it right and use the good stuff.

Temperature is another critical component to biscuit making. I like to freeze my butter overnight before making my biscuit dough. Then, I grate it using a cheese grater. This method ensures little (nearly) uniform shreds of butter get distributed throughout the dough for ultimate flakiness. One other trick is to use a chilled rolling pin to roll out the dough.  I find that anything I can do to keep the butter cold before baking will help enhance their flaky texture.

Last, shaping. Remember when I said these biscuits almost resemble croissants? That’s because I like to “faux” laminate my biscuit dough. I say “faux” because I don’t use a butter block and chill in between folds as one would when they make croissants. First, I roll out the dough into a square that’s about 1/2-inch thick. Then, I sprinkle the cinnamon chips and press them gently into the dough. Next, I fold the dough into thirds (like a brochure) and then in half again (hamburger fold). Then I give it a 90-degree turn and repeat these steps once. Finally, I roll out the dough a final time into a square that is just about 1-inch thick and cut out my biscuits. I usually get about 9 large biscuits out of this recipe and once cut, you can see all the pretty layers in the dough.

Once my biscuits are cut out, I place them on a baking sheet and brush them with melted homemade maple butter. The maple butter not only gives the biscuits a lovely, subtle maple flavor, but they also give them great color as the sugar in the syrup caramelizes in the oven. 

Finally, for an extra special treat, I like to drizzle these biscuits with a little maple icing just before serving. I mix a few tablespoons of milk and powdered sugar into any remaining melted maple butter and then pour it over the warm biscuits. Some may call this overkill, but I call it delicious.

If you’re not a fan of cinnamon, you can totally omit the cinnamon and cinnamon chips from this recipe and just make some stellar plain buttermilk biscuits as well. I’ve also mixed in fresh jalapeños and cheddar cheese, blueberries or chocolate chips before too with amazing results. The options are limitless so get creative and play around with different sweet or savory mix-ins. 

Are you a fellow biscuit lover like me? Do you have any tips or tricks that you’ve found help you make the perfect biscuits? Share them with me below in the comments. I love sharing my knowledge but I love learning from fellow foodies too!

If you try out this recipe, please give it a rating and don’t forget to tag me on social media. It’s @frydaeblog or #frydae absolutely everywhere. As always, thank you so much for stopping by my little corner of the internet and I hope you take a moment to see what else I’ve been cooking up in my kitchen. Have a wonderful weekend and happy Frydae!