sausage gravy & biscuits

Christmas comes once a year.
and certain meals probably should, too, if we are concerned about our colons (oh, and you can count on it that we are, thanks to the MD mister of the house).

so therefore... when we go to church and don't get to bed until the wee hours of the middle of the night... and sleep in until very late on Christmas morning.... you can bet your bottom dollar i'm gonna make a hearty, special, this-is-kind-of-bad-for-us-but-SO-delish kind of meal.

homemade sausage gravy and biscuits. BOOM.

homemade baking powder biscuits

makes about 4-8 biscuits (depending on how large you cut them) 

recipe adapted from my beautiful great-aunt joyce :)

***the only difference in our recipes: hers called for shortening (but i try with all my might NEVER to purchase crisco/lard/the likes... so i used butter. still turned out GREAT in my opinion) ;)

ingredients:

2 cups flour

1 Tablespoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

5 Tablespoons cold butter

2/3 cup milk

2 Tablespoons sugar (optional, or add more if you want super-sweet shortcakes)

directions:

sift together flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar (if you used any; I used a scant 2 tablespoons' worth today).  cut in butter until the mixture resembles a coarse meal (i actually don't own a pastry cutter or a food processor... so i used my hands. it actually worked out even better than i thought it would!!).  add milk until the dough pulls together & looks like you can knead it (i used 2/3 cup, but i added it 1/3 cup at a time).

turn out dough onto lightly floured surface, and roll out or pat out with hands to 1 inch in thickness.  cut out biscuits with your favorite cutter; i don't own biscuit cutters SO i took paula deen's advice and used an empty tin can! (she says the sharper your cutting instrument, the better--- that's why she doesn't use a regular drinking class to cut out biscuits).  bake at 400 degrees F for 12-15 minutes or until golden brown.  butter the tops of them when they come out of the oven for flavor and loveliness. :) 

note: for my first attempt at making biscuits... i thought these puffed up SO nicely!  you'll love them.  :)

sausage gravy

     ***SORRY i didn't follow a recipe for this..... so i can't give you amounts... but i can tell you what i did (hopefully with clarity and brevity for the sake of your sanity). :)

ingredients:

sausage

butter (if needed)

flour

milk

salt and pepper

directions:

1) cook sausage until well-done in skillet. (i had bob evans sausage links in my fridge, so i de-cased and used them).

2) turn off the heat; remove sausage from pan (put on plate & save it for the end).

3) if you have enough sausage grease in your pan, feel free to add the flour right to that and get cookin' on your roux.  however, i have no CLUE where my sausage grease was... my pan was dry as a bone.  therefore, i had to add about 3-4 tablespoons of butter to my pan to give it a little somethin--- then i added.. oh... probably 2-3-4? tablespoons of flour to make the roux and let it cook for probably 2-3 minutes on low to medium heat.

4) pour in milk... i just eyeballed it.  maybe i added... ohh... 2 cups' worth? maybe 2 and 1/2 cups?  maybe even 3.  continue to whisk constantly, leaving your heat on about medium.  you want your gravy to simmer and cook-- but NOT boil.

*note* keep scraping the bottom of your pan throughout this whole process: all the good, yummy bits at the bottom of the pan are your BFFs when making sausage gravy. :)

5) let the gravy thicken up as you continue to whisk it, and when it is thick enough to coat your spoon (slash, thick enough for your liking... you can add your sausage back in).

**6) if your gravy isn't thickening up, you can create some make-shift roux in your microwave (I did this today and it worked out just fine!).  i microwaved a little more butter, then added some flour and stirred it into the melted butter--- then i put that roux mixture back into the microwave for several more seconds to cook it a little--- then i added it to the simmering gravy.  this really helped my gravy a lot; it just wasn't as thick as i wanted and it was the only thing i could think of to thicken it more that would for SURE not ruin it or make it lumpy.

7) remember to taste along the way, adding salt & pepper as needed! :) 

enjoy with one of those fluffy, pillowy biscuits!!!



if sausage gravy & biscuits were as good for me as a big salad... i would honestly eat it at least once a week. :)