Much ado has been made about this flour. It's been said that this is the only flour to use for biscuits, especially if you're a Southerner. However, Smuckers bought this company up a few years ago and some bakers swear they can tell the difference. Honestly, I wouldn't know having only just recently baked with it myself.
The difference between White Lily's all-purpose flour is apparent upon opening the bag. I thought, wow, this looks like confectioners sugar! When they decided to put 'white' in White Lily, they really meant it! I actually read the label again just to make sure I had the right product because it even clumps up the way powdered sugar does. I'm guessing this has something to do with the soft winter wheat that is used (also the bleaching) to make this flour. This is what the White Lily website has to say about it:
"Soft winter wheat is a variety of wheat that has a low protein content and low gluten content. It is the type of flour recommended for cakes, biscuits, and quick breads. White Lily flour is lower in protein content because the soft wheat is pure-- not blended with hard wheat. Hard wheat has a much higher protein content and gluten content."
I decided to remake the Angel Biscuits with White Lily all-purpose flour and add Mexican vanilla bean as the Lee Brothers suggested in their Southern Cookbook. I also experimented with using all lard instead of 1/2 lard, 1/2 butter.
These were like puffy, vanilla-flecked cookies. I didn't add as much sugar as was suggested in the Lee Bros. recipe. I bet if I had, these definitely would've passed as cookies. These would be lovely with a nice glaze. My cousin suggested eating these with strawberries and cream. I think that sounds delicious.
If you'd like to make vanilla biscuits, just scrape out the beans of one vanilla bean pod into the dry ingredients of whatever biscuit recipe you'd like to use. Mix together. If you want to add more sugar, go for it. The smell of vanilla will quickly fill up your kitchen.
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