A lightened-up version of your Red Lobster favorite, these Cheddar Bay Biscuits are golden on the outside and fluffy and buttery on the inside.
Boy oh boy, this recipe was a journey. Every time I ask for recipe suggestions, tons of you ask me to recreate Red Lobster’s Cheddar Bay Biscuits. The problem is, I’d never had them before. I’m not sure how I’ve gone 38 years without stepping inside of a Red Lobster, but that’s just the truth.
So I made my first trip to Red Lobster, just for the biscuits. I thought the person taking my order would think I was crazy for getting just biscuits to go, but since these are considered the best thing on the menu, it probably happens often.
If you follow me on Instagram (@litecravings), you may have seen me try those for the first time in my stories. Oh my. Mind actually blown. But I knew I had my work cut out for me because those biscuits are RICH. I could taste the pounds of butter. Lol.
As you can see, my version came out cheesy and buttery and pretty darn close to the original.
HOW TO LIGHTEN UP CHEDDAR BAY BISCUITS
My first instinct was to go for a version of 2-ingredient dough, using nonfat, plain Greek yogurt. I see a lot of people making biscuits that way on IG. You can see by the picture below that I started with a nearly 1:1 ratio of flour and Greek yogurt.
The result was good, but I could taste the yogurt way too much. It didn’t have that buttery flavor of the original and was too tangy. That’s actually why I’m not a huge fan of 2-ingredient pizza dough, either. I’d rather play around with an extra point or two for much better flavor.
Adding melted light butter (I use Earth Balance whipped) to the flour, along with almond milk and spices, and just a little bit of Greek yogurt to tenderize the batter was the perfect solution.
The dough comes out pretty wet, so an ice cream scooper helps with portioning each one out. Think about 3 tablespoons of dough for each biscuit.
I’m able to get 10-11 biscuits each time, but I’m calculating points and calories for 10 total just to be safe.
Comparing points and calories
There’s no doubt that the Red Lobster biscuits are insanely good and totally worth a splurge once in a while. Each biscuits is around 160 calories, 10 grams of fat, and 6 WW SmartPoints on all plans.
The problem is that I’m not sure how anyone would eat just one of those. I could easily eat three or four without even thinking about it. There goes all of my points for the day!
My version cuts all of those stats in half. So even if you have three in one sitting, you’re only down 9 SP. That’s no too bad! Especially if you pair it with a really low point soup like my veggie-packed Broccoli Cheese Soup.
I’d love to hear from you if you make this recipe! It makes my day when you share your pics on Instagram and tag me (@litecravings). Don’t forget to use #litecravingsrecipes to make sure I see it. If I don’t get a chance to scroll through my tags quickly enough, I won’t see your post. I always make a point to look through the hashtags, though, so I’ll see it there!
Cheddar Bay Biscuits
Ingredients
- 1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp Old Bay seasoning
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1/2 tsp onion powder
- 1/4 tsp kosher salt
- 1/2 cup shredded, reduced-fat cheddar cheese
- 3 tbsp light butter, divided
- 3/4 cup almond milk
- 1/4 cup nonfat, plain Greek yogurt
- (optional) fresh minced parsley to garnish
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400F. In a medium bowl, mix together flour, baking powder, spices, and cheese.
- Melt 2 tablespoons of butter (save the other tablespoon for the tops of the cooked biscuits). Mix melted butter into flour mixture to disperse evenly.
- Whisk in almond milk and Greek yogurt until just mixed together. The dough will be very wet.
- Grease a baking sheet with cooking spray. Use an ice cream scoop or about three tablespoons to portion the dough into 10 equal rounds.
- Bake for 16-20 minutes, or until tops are somewhat firm. Broil for a minute if you want more browned tops.
- Melt remaining tablespoon of butter. Remove pan from oven and brush tops of biscuits with the melted butter. Let rest for at least 5 minutes before eating.
- (optional) Sprinkle tops with extra salt and chopped parsley.
You would legit never know these are lightened up. They are SO GOOD
Thank you for the quick review, Sharon! Made my night.
what is your favorite reduced-calorie cheddar cheese?
Can you make the dough a day or two ahead of time and refrigerate?
These were a huge hit in my house! We polished off the entire batch 🥴 Can’t wait to try more of.your recipes!! Thanks Geri!
You’re so welcome, Molly!
Have you tried skyr as a substitute for Greek yogurt? Much less tangy!
Nope, I don’t taste the tang at all in the recipe. Just provides creaminess in place of soo much butter. 🙂
I can wait to try these! Thank you for the hard work and sharing.
You’re very welcome! I hope you like the recipe!
Do you think I could use regular 2% milk? I don’t typically buy almond milk. I know it’s fewer calories, but the lack of protein or other nutritional value turns me off from using it (I actually use ultra filtered milk instead of regular – much less sugar and more protein) but I don’t know if it would mess up the consistency. (I’m not on WW, btw, but I am trying to cut calories and carbs. Well, the carbs I’m obviously not going all out on since I’m looking at this recipe, haha.) I’m also going to need to use gluten free flour…fingers crossed…!
2% would be great! Almond milk has tons of nutrients and health benefits, but I understand the concern for lack of protein.
These are amazing! Very easy to make and even easier to devour! Great recipe.
So glad you liked them. Thank you for the review!
These are amazing.
Followed the recipe except changed almond milk to 2% milk (which I read from the comments should have been fine to do). The dough was like pancake batter thin -I thought hmm okay I’ll try it…after 18 minutes in the oven I now have pita height biscuits? They taste okay but not a fluffy biscuit- more like a flat one. Next time I’d add more flour, cut the milk out completely or decrease the amount of yogurt in here because although these taste good I really wanted a biscuit !
Hi Adrianna,
Sorry to hear the biscuits didn’t turn out for you this time. The type of milk wouldn’t affect the recipe so I was trying to think of other factors. Was your baking powder new? Did you use thicker Greek yogurt vs regular? Could the oven still have been pre-heating? Do you live in a humid climate? All of those might be contributing factors – I’d love to try and troubleshoot with you. Let me know!