For special occasions*, maybe 4 or 5 times a year, I make biscuits and gravy. I never make the same biscuit recipe twice because except for one time, they've all been subpar. Far superior to restaurant biscuits of course, or Poppinfresh junk, but not worth the effort. Decades ago I was making pretty good ones using self-rising flour so I have gone back to that even though it seems wrong. And I worry about the flour losing its fizz over time. But I have used it 3x now and it's consistently better than normal, even if I use fancy baking powder or make my own with cream of tartar etc etc. So that's settled: Self-Rising Flour is the biscuit go-to. I also hear it's a lower-protein flour, more like cake flour. Okay.

As far as the fat component, I started decades ago with Crisco, back when it was the worst itchy-aorta product imaginable. They were good, but the butter-flavor ones were ridiculously good. But I moved on. I've used butter exclusively since then. Cheap salted butter (higher water content=more steam=flaky and fluffy, so the theory goes). Expensive unsalted butter. Heavy cream. Buttermilk. Plain yogurt. Plain greek yogurt (pretty good, tbh). Just milk. Milk curdled with lemon or vinegar. Olive oil. Peanut oil. Coconut oil. 

I've experimented with giant globs of butter, vs pea-sized bits, vs "like coarse corn meal." More liquid, less liquid, flouring and folding and rolling and flouring and folding and rolling again. Brushing with melted butter before folding/rolling/oiling/folding/rolling. 

Today's combination might be the best in years:
2 cups Self-rising Flour. More or less.
1/4 pound LARD. This was the shelf-stable SnoCap brand. If you google "cooking with lard," you'll find a lot of mythology that says it's awful and you should render your own but let's just not.
1 Cup buttermilk
I mixed the cold lard into the flour with my fingers. I started out trying to maintain some pea-sized lumps but as I worked it, it liquefied so I just went with it and wound up with the coarse meal texture. Dumped in the cup of buttermilk and was instantly aware that it wasn't enough (flour dries out here) so I poured in another 1/4 cup of half & half and even that was pretty dry so I added another splash. When I could stir it with a wooden spoon, I was done. Dumped on a floured cutting board and patted it out, fold/pat/fold/pat a dozen times. Cut with my Knob Creek Individual Cocktail Shaker, which is about 2-1/2" across and baked at 450 until they were starting to brown on the top. I was worried that they'd been in too long and would turn hard on the bottom and this turned out to be perfect timing. I could/should have brushed the tops with milk to make them more attractively golden on top. Without prompting, these were praised as "really good" and then when I told them the secret, "you didn't need to ruin it for us."

Then of course sausage gravy because the girl likes gravy. This time I minced up about 1/4 of an onion and I liked it better but I'm not sure about anyone else. 

Scrambled eggs. I think I'm going to start a food blog called "1000 ways to cook eggs wrong" because nobody agrees on how to scramble eggs. I have 3 go-to methods for scrambled eggs that give wildly different results that everyone agrees are "scrambled eggs" but they're completely different from each other. And there are dozens more techniques for scrambled eggs that I may or may not use from time to time. One of the coolest was using the steam wand of our espresso machine: Drop one egg in a buttered straight-sided frothing pitcher, a tablespoon of minced onion and bell pepper, some shredded cheese and a thimble worth of cream. Steam with the wand until it's fluffy and set. Tip the pitcher upside down on a toasted bagel. A lot of water will seep out and into the bagel which IMO makes it delicious but know your audience: Lots of people will think this is wrong so tip the liquid out into the sink first. If your food prep is already done before hand, this whole process takes 45 seconds. The egg will be spreadable for a few seconds. Add a slice of tomato and cream cheese and some people like mustard and ham. But today I just whisked some half and half into the eggs and into a skillet and stirred them over a medium-hot fire until they were almost set. By the time they were served, there were no runny bits left.

Coffee
And then a handful of drugs I take to combat the ill effects of eating like that.

Note: I actually bought the lard to make flour tortillas. I made some last week and the recipe called for "cooking oil" so I used peanut oil and they tasted like flour and regret. And turned to crackers. So I made lavash without meaning to. So later this week I'll make some lardy tortillas and report back.

*Today it's Augusta's weekend visit home from college.

For special occasions*, maybe 4 or 5 times a year, I make biscuits and gravy. I never make the same biscuit recipe twice because except for one time, they've all been subpar. Far superior to restaurant biscuits of course, or Poppinfresh junk, but not worth the effort. Decades ago I was making pretty good ones using self-rising flour so I have gone back to that even though it seems wrong. And I worry about the flour losing its fizz over time. But I have used it 3x now and it's consistently better than normal, even if I use fancy baking powder or make my own with cream of tartar etc etc. So that's settled: Self-Rising Flour is the biscuit go-to. I also hear it's a lower-protein flour, more like cake flour. Okay.

As far as the fat component, I started decades ago with Crisco, back when it was the worst itchy-aorta product imaginable. They were good, but the butter-flavor ones were ridiculously good. But I moved on. I've used butter exclusively since then. Cheap salted butter (higher water content=more steam=flaky and fluffy, so the theory goes). Expensive unsalted butter. Heavy cream. Buttermilk. Plain yogurt. Plain greek yogurt (pretty good, tbh). Just milk. Milk curdled with lemon or vinegar. Olive oil. Peanut oil. Coconut oil. 

I've experimented with giant globs of butter, vs pea-sized bits, vs "like coarse corn meal." More liquid, less liquid, flouring and folding and rolling and flouring and folding and rolling again. Brushing with melted butter before folding/rolling/oiling/folding/rolling. 

Today's combination might be the best in years:
2 cups Self-rising Flour. More or less.
1/4 pound LARD. This was the shelf-stable SnoCap brand. If you google "cooking with lard," you'll find a lot of mythology that says it's awful and you should render your own but let's just not.
1 Cup buttermilk
I mixed the cold lard into the flour with my fingers. I started out trying to maintain some pea-sized lumps but as I worked it, it liquefied so I just went with it and wound up with the coarse meal texture. Dumped in the cup of buttermilk and was instantly aware that it wasn't enough (flour dries out here) so I poured in another 1/4 cup of half & half and even that was pretty dry so I added another splash. When I could stir it with a wooden spoon, I was done. Dumped on a floured cutting board and patted it out, fold/pat/fold/pat a dozen times. Cut with my Knob Creek Individual Cocktail Shaker, which is about 2-1/2" across and baked at 450 until they were starting to brown on the top. I was worried that they'd been in too long and would turn hard on the bottom and this turned out to be perfect timing. I could/should have brushed the tops with milk to make them more attractively golden on top. Without prompting, these were praised as "really good" and then when I told them the secret, "you didn't need to ruin it for us."

Then of course sausage gravy because the girl likes gravy. This time I minced up about 1/4 of an onion and I liked it better but I'm not sure about anyone else. 

Scrambled eggs. I think I'm going to start a food blog called "1000 ways to cook eggs wrong" because nobody agrees on how to scramble eggs. I have 3 go-to methods for scrambled eggs that give wildly different results that everyone agrees are "scrambled eggs" but they're completely different from each other. And there are dozens more techniques for scrambled eggs that I may or may not use from time to time. One of the coolest was using the steam wand of our espresso machine: Drop one egg in a buttered straight-sided frothing pitcher, a tablespoon of minced onion and bell pepper, some shredded cheese and a thimble worth of cream. Steam with the wand until it's fluffy and set. Tip the pitcher upside down on a toasted bagel. A lot of water will seep out and into the bagel which IMO makes it delicious but know your audience: Lots of people will think this is wrong so tip the liquid out into the sink first. If your food prep is already done before hand, this whole process takes 45 seconds. The egg will be spreadable for a few seconds. Add a slice of tomato and cream cheese and some people like mustard and ham. But today I just whisked some half and half into the eggs and into a skillet and stirred them over a medium-hot fire until they were almost set. By the time they were served, there were no runny bits left.

Coffee
And then a handful of drugs I take to combat the ill effects of eating like that.

Note: I actually bought the lard to make flour tortillas. I made some last week and the recipe called for "cooking oil" so I used peanut oil and they tasted like flour and regret. And turned to crackers. So I made lavash without meaning to. So later this week I'll make some lardy tortillas and report back.

*Today it's Augusta's weekend visit home from college.

For special occasions*, maybe 4 or 5 times a year, I make biscuits and gravy. I never make the same biscuit recipe twice because except for one time, they've all been subpar. Far superior to restaurant biscuits of course, or Poppinfresh junk, but not worth the effort. Decades ago I was making pretty good ones using self-rising flour so I have gone back to that even though it seems wrong. And I worry about the flour losing its fizz over time. But I have used it 3x now and it's consistently better than normal, even if I use fancy baking powder or make my own with cream of tartar etc etc. So that's settled: Self-Rising Flour is the biscuit go-to. I also hear it's a lower-protein flour, more like cake flour. Okay.

As far as the fat component, I started decades ago with Crisco, back when it was the worst itchy-aorta product imaginable. They were good, but the butter-flavor ones were ridiculously good. But I moved on. I've used butter exclusively since then. Cheap salted butter (higher water content=more steam=flaky and fluffy, so the theory goes). Expensive unsalted butter. Heavy cream. Buttermilk. Plain yogurt. Plain greek yogurt (pretty good, tbh). Just milk. Milk curdled with lemon or vinegar. Olive oil. Peanut oil. Coconut oil. 

I've experimented with giant globs of butter, vs pea-sized bits, vs "like coarse corn meal." More liquid, less liquid, flouring and folding and rolling and flouring and folding and rolling again. Brushing with melted butter before folding/rolling/oiling/folding/rolling. 

Today's combination might be the best in years:
2 cups Self-rising Flour. More or less.
1/4 pound LARD. This was the shelf-stable SnoCap brand. If you google "cooking with lard," you'll find a lot of mythology that says it's awful and you should render your own but let's just not.
1 Cup buttermilk
I mixed the cold lard into the flour with my fingers. I started out trying to maintain some pea-sized lumps but as I worked it, it liquefied so I just went with it and wound up with the coarse meal texture. Dumped in the cup of buttermilk and was instantly aware that it wasn't enough (flour dries out here) so I poured in another 1/4 cup of half & half and even that was pretty dry so I added another splash. When I could stir it with a wooden spoon, I was done. Dumped on a floured cutting board and patted it out, fold/pat/fold/pat a dozen times. Cut with my Knob Creek Individual Cocktail Shaker, which is about 2-1/2" across and baked at 450 until they were starting to brown on the top. I was worried that they'd been in too long and would turn hard on the bottom and this turned out to be perfect timing. I could/should have brushed the tops with milk to make them more attractively golden on top. Without prompting, these were praised as "really good" and then when I told them the secret, "you didn't need to ruin it for us."

Then of course sausage gravy because the girl likes gravy. This time I minced up about 1/4 of an onion and I liked it better but I'm not sure about anyone else. 

Scrambled eggs. I think I'm going to start a food blog called "1000 ways to cook eggs wrong" because nobody agrees on how to scramble eggs. I have 3 go-to methods for scrambled eggs that give wildly different results that everyone agrees are "scrambled eggs" but they're completely different from each other. And there are dozens more techniques for scrambled eggs that I may or may not use from time to time. One of the coolest was using the steam wand of our espresso machine: Drop one egg in a buttered straight-sided frothing pitcher, a tablespoon of minced onion and bell pepper, some shredded cheese and a thimble worth of cream. Steam with the wand until it's fluffy and set. Tip the pitcher upside down on a toasted bagel. A lot of water will seep out and into the bagel which IMO makes it delicious but know your audience: Lots of people will think this is wrong so tip the liquid out into the sink first. If your food prep is already done before hand, this whole process takes 45 seconds. The egg will be spreadable for a few seconds. Add a slice of tomato and cream cheese and some people like mustard and ham. But today I just whisked some half and half into the eggs and into a skillet and stirred them over a medium-hot fire until they were almost set. By the time they were served, there were no runny bits left.

Coffee
And then a handful of drugs I take to combat the ill effects of eating like that.

Note: I actually bought the lard to make flour tortillas. I made some last week and the recipe called for "cooking oil" so I used peanut oil and they tasted like flour and regret. And turned to crackers. So I made lavash without meaning to. So later this week I'll make some lardy tortillas and report back.

*Today it's Augusta's weekend visit home from college.

For special occasions*, maybe 4 or 5 times a year, I make biscuits and gravy. I never make the same biscuit recipe twice because except for one time, they've all been subpar. Far superior to restaurant biscuits of course, or Poppinfresh junk, but not worth the effort. Decades ago I was making pretty good ones using self-rising flour so I have gone back to that even though it seems wrong. And I worry about the flour losing its fizz over time. But I have used it 3x now and it's consistently better than normal, even if I use fancy baking powder or make my own with cream of tartar etc etc. So that's settled: Self-Rising Flour is the biscuit go-to. I also hear it's a lower-protein flour, more like cake flour. Okay.

As far as the fat component, I started decades ago with Crisco, back when it was the worst itchy-aorta product imaginable. They were good, but the butter-flavor ones were ridiculously good. But I moved on. I've used butter exclusively since then. Cheap salted butter (higher water content=more steam=flaky and fluffy, so the theory goes). Expensive unsalted butter. Heavy cream. Buttermilk. Plain yogurt. Plain greek yogurt (pretty good, tbh). Just milk. Milk curdled with lemon or vinegar. Olive oil. Peanut oil. Coconut oil. 

I've experimented with giant globs of butter, vs pea-sized bits, vs "like coarse corn meal." More liquid, less liquid, flouring and folding and rolling and flouring and folding and rolling again. Brushing with melted butter before folding/rolling/oiling/folding/rolling. 

Today's combination might be the best in years:
2 cups Self-rising Flour. More or less.
1/4 pound LARD. This was the shelf-stable SnoCap brand. If you google "cooking with lard," you'll find a lot of mythology that says it's awful and you should render your own but let's just not.
1 Cup buttermilk
I mixed the cold lard into the flour with my fingers. I started out trying to maintain some pea-sized lumps but as I worked it, it liquefied so I just went with it and wound up with the coarse meal texture. Dumped in the cup of buttermilk and was instantly aware that it wasn't enough (flour dries out here) so I poured in another 1/4 cup of half & half and even that was pretty dry so I added another splash. When I could stir it with a wooden spoon, I was done. Dumped on a floured cutting board and patted it out, fold/pat/fold/pat a dozen times. Cut with my Knob Creek Individual Cocktail Shaker, which is about 2-1/2" across and baked at 450 until they were starting to brown on the top. I was worried that they'd been in too long and would turn hard on the bottom and this turned out to be perfect timing. I could/should have brushed the tops with milk to make them more attractively golden on top. Without prompting, these were praised as "really good" and then when I told them the secret, "you didn't need to ruin it for us."

Then of course sausage gravy because the girl likes gravy. This time I minced up about 1/4 of an onion and I liked it better but I'm not sure about anyone else. 

Scrambled eggs. I think I'm going to start a food blog called "1000 ways to cook eggs wrong" because nobody agrees on how to scramble eggs. I have 3 go-to methods for scrambled eggs that give wildly different results that everyone agrees are "scrambled eggs" but they're completely different from each other. And there are dozens more techniques for scrambled eggs that I may or may not use from time to time. One of the coolest was using the steam wand of our espresso machine: Drop one egg in a buttered straight-sided frothing pitcher, a tablespoon of minced onion and bell pepper, some shredded cheese and a thimble worth of cream. Steam with the wand until it's fluffy and set. Tip the pitcher upside down on a toasted bagel. A lot of water will seep out and into the bagel which IMO makes it delicious but know your audience: Lots of people will think this is wrong so tip the liquid out into the sink first. If your food prep is already done before hand, this whole process takes 45 seconds. The egg will be spreadable for a few seconds. Add a slice of tomato and cream cheese and some people like mustard and ham. But today I just whisked some half and half into the eggs and into a skillet and stirred them over a medium-hot fire until they were almost set. By the time they were served, there were no runny bits left.

Coffee
And then a handful of drugs I take to combat the ill effects of eating like that.

Note: I actually bought the lard to make flour tortillas. I made some last week and the recipe called for "cooking oil" so I used peanut oil and they tasted like flour and regret. And turned to crackers. So I made lavash without meaning to. So later this week I'll make some lardy tortillas and report back.

*Today it's Augusta's weekend visit home from college.

For special occasions*, maybe 4 or 5 times a year, I make biscuits and gravy. I never make the same biscuit recipe twice because except for one time, they've all been subpar. Far superior to restaurant biscuits of course, or Poppinfresh junk, but not worth the effort. Decades ago I was making pretty good ones using self-rising flour so I have gone back to that even though it seems wrong. And I worry about the flour losing its fizz over time. But I have used it 3x now and it's consistently better than normal, even if I use fancy baking powder or make my own with cream of tartar etc etc. So that's settled: Self-Rising Flour is the biscuit go-to. I also hear it's a lower-protein flour, more like cake flour. Okay.

As far as the fat component, I started decades ago with Crisco, back when it was the worst itchy-aorta product imaginable. They were good, but the butter-flavor ones were ridiculously good. But I moved on. I've used butter exclusively since then. Cheap salted butter (higher water content=more steam=flaky and fluffy, so the theory goes). Expensive unsalted butter. Heavy cream. Buttermilk. Plain yogurt. Plain greek yogurt (pretty good, tbh). Just milk. Milk curdled with lemon or vinegar. Olive oil. Peanut oil. Coconut oil. 

I've experimented with giant globs of butter, vs pea-sized bits, vs "like coarse corn meal." More liquid, less liquid, flouring and folding and rolling and flouring and folding and rolling again. Brushing with melted butter before folding/rolling/oiling/folding/rolling. 

Today's combination might be the best in years:
2 cups Self-rising Flour. More or less.
1/4 pound LARD. This was the shelf-stable SnoCap brand. If you google "cooking with lard," you'll find a lot of mythology that says it's awful and you should render your own but let's just not.
1 Cup buttermilk
I mixed the cold lard into the flour with my fingers. I started out trying to maintain some pea-sized lumps but as I worked it, it liquefied so I just went with it and wound up with the coarse meal texture. Dumped in the cup of buttermilk and was instantly aware that it wasn't enough (flour dries out here) so I poured in another 1/4 cup of half & half and even that was pretty dry so I added another splash. When I could stir it with a wooden spoon, I was done. Dumped on a floured cutting board and patted it out, fold/pat/fold/pat a dozen times. Cut with my Knob Creek Individual Cocktail Shaker, which is about 2-1/2" across and baked at 450 until they were starting to brown on the top. I was worried that they'd been in too long and would turn hard on the bottom and this turned out to be perfect timing. I could/should have brushed the tops with milk to make them more attractively golden on top. Without prompting, these were praised as "really good" and then when I told them the secret, "you didn't need to ruin it for us."

Then of course sausage gravy because the girl likes gravy. This time I minced up about 1/4 of an onion and I liked it better but I'm not sure about anyone else. 

Scrambled eggs. I think I'm going to start a food blog called "1000 ways to cook eggs wrong" because nobody agrees on how to scramble eggs. I have 3 go-to methods for scrambled eggs that give wildly different results that everyone agrees are "scrambled eggs" but they're completely different from each other. And there are dozens more techniques for scrambled eggs that I may or may not use from time to time. One of the coolest was using the steam wand of our espresso machine: Drop one egg in a buttered straight-sided frothing pitcher, a tablespoon of minced onion and bell pepper, some shredded cheese and a thimble worth of cream. Steam with the wand until it's fluffy and set. Tip the pitcher upside down on a toasted bagel. A lot of water will seep out and into the bagel which IMO makes it delicious but know your audience: Lots of people will think this is wrong so tip the liquid out into the sink first. If your food prep is already done before hand, this whole process takes 45 seconds. The egg will be spreadable for a few seconds. Add a slice of tomato and cream cheese and some people like mustard and ham. But today I just whisked some half and half into the eggs and into a skillet and stirred them over a medium-hot fire until they were almost set. By the time they were served, there were no runny bits left.

Coffee
And then a handful of drugs I take to combat the ill effects of eating like that.

Note: I actually bought the lard to make flour tortillas. I made some last week and the recipe called for "cooking oil" so I used peanut oil and they tasted like flour and regret. And turned to crackers. So I made lavash without meaning to. So later this week I'll make some lardy tortillas and report back.

*Today it's Augusta's weekend visit home from college.

my sort of "french" spin on coffee, bacon and eggs

i knew i was in the zone when my bacon came out perfect