Howie’s Strawberry Shortcake

Howard Bulka
May 11
3 min read

Updated: Jun 5

Months ago, I was walking the aisles of Sigona’s, the fabulous little greengrocer on Middlefield across from Costco, and came upon perfect strawberries, little jewels grown in the Santa Maria Valley, a coastal region where cold nights, warm days and salt air create a microclimate that produces the finest strawberries.

Grown and sold locally, they can be ripened on the vine and brought to market ruby red without the white shoulders and green tips common to strawberries grown in the central valley or Mexico. They are sweet for sure, but more importantly they are remarkably flavorful, with a taste reminiscent of strawberry jam. They are all the inspiration a cook needs.

The Secret to a Great Strawberry Shortcake

Strawberry shortcake is, like a lot of the recipes I have shared with you, a simple recipe that is darned difficult to make well. Contrary to conventional culinary wisdom, a great strawberry shortcake is not fundamentally about the biscuit, it’s important certainly, but what distinguishes a good shortcake from a great shortcake is the strawberries.

The fruit component of strawberry shortcake is often just sliced under-ripe strawberries and a bit sugar. But it can’t be. Strawberry shortcake should make us remember that strawberries are crazy delicious. Everything else in the recipe is there to support that premise. Before I put an abrupt end to this truncated missive, I’m going to share with you the secret to a great Strawberry Shortcake.

It’s ridiculously simple, but it will change your shortcake, if not your life forever. The secret to a great Strawberry Shortcake is to prepare the strawberry sauce such that it is the sweetest component of the dish. By far. That is to say, the biscuit and the whipped cream must be under sweetened.

For each bite to make sense, it must contain all three components: biscuit, cream and strawberries. Spoon in hand, each guest decides, according to their own taste, where the balance of sweet and tart (the sweet spot?) is found, maximizing the flavor of the strawberries. When that happens, kaboom!

Two bites are usually enough. It’s magical.

PRO TIP: Refrigerate the prepared strawberries overnight (a minimum 4 hours) before putting this dessert together.

THE RECIPE

Strawberry Shortcake

Yield Six Servings

The Biscuits Ingredients + Preparation

250 g all purpose flour

3 Tbl cornstarch

1 ¼ Tbl baking powder

¼ tsp baking soda

2 Tbl sugar

1 tsp salt

145 g butter, cold diced

185 g buttermilk, cold

sugar/milk for glaze, as needed

How to make the Shortcakes:

Place the dry ingredients into to the bowl of a food processor fitted with the steel blade.
Work briefly to combine.
Add the Butter. Work briefly until mixture is crumbly, ¼ inch pieces of butter should be visible.
Add buttermilk. Pulse a few times until mixture is shaggy, but all dry ingredients have been incorporated.
Scoop (portion) the dough into 6 roughly shaped balls.
Lay out the balls on a lined and/or greased half sheet pan (2 x 3).
Brush the tops of the biscuits with milk.
Sprinkle with a bit of sugar.
Bake at 425°F for 15-20 minutes or until tops and bottoms are golden brown.

The Strawberries Ingredients + Preparation

You will need:

3 Tbl raspberry jam

¼ cup hot water

2 lb strawberries, topped and thinly sliced

120 g granulated sugar

½- 1 lemon, juice only

Dissolve raspberry jam in the hot water.
Combine all ingredients in a mixing bowl.
Use your (clean) hands or a potato masher to crush roughly one-third of the berries.
Refrigerate for 4 hours or preferably overnight.

The Cream

2 cups heavy cream

25 g powdered sugar

Combine the cream and the sugar.
Whip by hand or with power tools until very soft peaks. Mixture should be very soft peaks. Runny but not easily pourable. Do not over whip.

To Assemble the Strawberry Shortcake

Split each biscuit in half horizontally.
Place the bottom half of the biscuit onto a plate or soup plate.
Place a half cup (roughly one-sixth) of the strawberry mixture onto each biscuit bottom, taking care to distribute the juice as well as the fruit, allowing the biscuit to soak in the yummy juices.
Place a big ass dollop of whipped cream on top.
Place the top half of the biscuit on top of the whipped cream.
Garnish as noted, or not.
Enjoy.