Oh yesss! We love our mama’s biscuits, soft, flaky, melt-in-your-mouth mounds of utter goodness. But hold on! Guess you thought biscuits originated in the South? Wrong! They actually came to these shores from England but their roots can be traced back to the Middle Ages.
The British actually coined the term biscuit to describe their thin cookie and cracker-like edibles. By the time the biscuit arrived in this country and southern cooks got hold of the recipe, it was plumped up to resemble a kind of quick bread.
In the pre-Civil War south, biscuits were more like delicacies and only eaten on Sundays. Since flour was pretty hard to come by southerners would oftentimes substitute it by using sweet potatoes in their recipes which were plentiful.
Biscuits have come a long way and generations upon generations of families have passed down variations of biscuit family recipes. They are served as a side dish with a meal and consumed at any time during the day. Many love eating hot biscuits with butter and a sweet condiment like honey or jam/jelly. Others just love sopping up gravy or sauces with biscuits. These savory delights are even breakfast sandwiches with eggs and a meat sandwiched in between.
If you’ve always wanted to make biscuits from scratch but have chickened out, here is a recipe for them that is simple and pretty foolproof:
Ingredients:
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 1 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 10 tablespoons cubed butter
- 3/4 cup (approximately) milk
Directions:
Preheat oven to 425 °F.
In a large bowl combine flour, sugar, baking powder and salt together. Cut butter into mixture until it begins to look like cornmeal.
Slowly add milk into the middle of the flour mixture (make an indent to the center). Knead the dough with your fingers and add milk when necessary. Roll out dough onto a lightly floured surface and roll out to desired thickness. Cut with small biscuit cutter.
Butter bottom of a non-stick pan and place biscuits in it. Bake for about 12 minutes or until golden brown. Try brushing the tops of the biscuits with melted butter when they come out of the oven and…HAVE MERCY!!
*(You can jazz up these biscuits by adding shredded cheddar cheese into the mixture.)