A Southern Favorite – Biscuits and Gravy

No matter what restaurant you go to in the South, you are bound to find Biscuits and Gravy on the menu.  It is a favorite breakfast among Southerners.  Who can resist a hot flaky biscuit fresh from the oven.  Now add some creamy sausage gravy and it becomes even harder to turn down!

In days gone by breakfast was often the most substantial meal of the day in the South.  Farmers and those who worked in the fields needed a hardy meal to fuel them for the work that lay ahead of them.  The lack of supplies and money meant breakfast had to be not only hardy, but be cheap as well.  Pork was plentiful and thus sausage was readily available.  Biscuits have always been a staple of Southern fare, so making gravy from the sausage and pairing the two together was a natural and made for a filling, cheap and delicious meal.

Many people love gravy but are afraid of making it because in other attempts they have ended up with just a thick, white, pasty mess.  We will walk you through the steps to make sure that doesn’t happen this time.  If you’ve never had sausage and biscuits before you should give it a try this weekend. Your taste buds will thank you.  Your family will too 🙂

Biscuits

2 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 Tablespoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
6 Tablespoons butter, very cold and cut into chunks
1 cup buttermilk, approximately

Mix flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt together.  Either by hand with a pastry blender or in a food processor, cut butter into flour until mixture looks like course meal or sand.  Slowly add buttermilk stirring just until flour mixture comes together in a ball. (You may need a bit less of the buttermilk but you may need a bit more.  The reason for this is that the consistency and moisture of the flour you are using may vary.  On a rainy day for example, the flour may absorb the milk more quickly and you would need need less buttermilk. If however the weather happens to be very hot and dry, you may find yourself needing more buttermilk.)

Knead the biscuit dough a couple of turns and then roll it out to about 3/4 inch thickness.  Using a round cookie cutter or a biscuit cutter, and pressing straight down, cut out biscuits.  It is important NOT to turn the cutter side to side as you are cutting the dough but to only press straight down and lift straight up.  The reason for this is that when you twist the biscuit cutter you “seal” the sides of the biscuit dough making it more difficult for the biscuits to rise while baking.
After biscuits are cut, place them without touching, on a baking pan lined with a silpat liner or parchment paper.

Re-roll any left over dough and cut out remainder of the biscuits.  Only re-roll the dough once.  Re-rolling it more than once will produce tough, heavy biscuits.  Bake in a 400 degree oven for about 12 minutes or until the biscuits have risen and the tops are golden brown.

If serving with gravy, split biscuits open in two and top with sausage gravy.

Sausage Gravy

1 pound of bulk sausage (Farmer John sausage does not have nitrates and is preferable)
1 heaping tablespoon of flour
1 teaspoon kosher or sea salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
2 cups whole milk

Brown the sausage and, using your spoon, break up sausage into bite sized pieces.

When all the sausage is thoroughly browned, drain off all but 2 Tablespoons of fat.  Stir in the flour, salt and pepper.  Keep stirring constantly to evenly cook flour with sausage and also to make sure flour does not stick on the bottom of the pan.

Stir in milk that has been warmed slightly either in the microwave oven or in a pan on top of the stove.  Keep stirring while gravy begins to thicken.

Taste and adjust seasoning as necessary.  (If the  gravy is going to sit for more than about 10  minutes you may need to add a bit more milk to thin it to the consistency you like.  This could mean you will need to adjust salt and pepper as well.)

Spoon gravy over the top of biscuits.  This could be the start of a great weekend 🙂