Let me take you to biscuit town

 

Once upon a time I lived in Savannah, GA.  It was hot and humid, and the food and the lifestyle fit that climate.

 

The humidity there is like nothing I have experienced before.  Walking out the door it almost knocks you down.  You can taste it.  You can feel it in your lungs.  Have you ever been in a sauna?  It’s kind of like that.

 

The heat slows things down.  My college classes didn’t start until 9am.  People seem more relaxed.  It’s hard to get really worked up when it’s that hot.  It’s just too much work.  Everything slows down and folks drink sweet tea on their porch swings.

 

And the food.  Oh the food.  That’s slower too.  In a really good, butter filled, Paula Deen kind of way.  The soul food place around the corner from our apartment filled the neighborhood with amazing smells every morning.  I totally searched and searched online and couldn’t find the name of the place, just a blurry photo on google maps.    

 This tiny puppy would try to go in on our morning walks and the woman who owned it would say hi to her.  It was totally adorable, just like her at that age.

 

 

I always think about that time and place when I make biscuits.  Eating perfect southern biscuits just feels right there.  True facts.

 

A good biscuit should be light and fluffy but also heavy and filling.  I know, it doesn’t make sense, but really it does.  I promise.  It’s a delicate balance, difficult to achieve.

I made biscuits this weekend to go with my bacon mac and cheese and roasted broccoli with cream and breadcrumbs.

It felt like a meal from Savannah.  It was pure comfort food.  There was nothing light about this meal.  It was however amazing and has feed me at least 3 meals since making it.  Not to mention all the breakfast sandwiches my husband made with the left over biscuits.  He’s a bacon sandwich kind of guy.

If you’ve never made biscuits, it’s really easy.  15 minutes prep, 15 to bake, easy.  No yeast or rising involved.  Try it, you won’t fail.  And you wont go back to those prepackaged canned things.  Read the ingredients on one of those sometime.  Mildly terrifying.

 

Make some biscuits, you won’t be sorry.  Eat em up.  Load em with bacon.  And cheese.  And eggs.  Or smother them with sausage gravy.  Oh man, sausage gravy.

 

Southern Biscuits

 

Adapted from Alton Brown

 

Ingredients

 

2 cups flour

4 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 teaspoon salt

3 tablespoons butter

2 tablespoons shortening

1 cup buttermilk, chilled

 

Directions

 

1.  Preheat oven to 450 degrees.  In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.  Turn on mixer at medium speed using paddle attachment.   Add butter, shortening and buttermilk.  Mix until well combined, about a minute.  The dough will be very sticky.

 

2.  By hand add up to 1/2 cup more of flour, until dough is easier to handle.

 

3.  Turn dough onto floured surface, dust top with flour and gently fold dough over on itself 5 or 6 times. Roll out into a 1-inch thick round. Cut out biscuits with a 2-inch cutter (or a glass), being sure to push straight down through the dough. Place biscuits on baking sheet so that they just touch. Reform scrap dough, working it as little as possible and continue cutting. (Biscuits from the second pass will not be quite as light as those from the first, but hey, that’s life.)

 

4.  Bake until biscuits are tall and light gold on top, 15 to 20 minutes.  When they look almost done, brush the tops with melted butter and bake 2 more minutes.