Southern Biscuits and Gravy
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Until Matthew joined the military, I had spent most of my life between the Northwest and the Midwest. While my family did a lot of traveling and road-tripping, we never made it to the south; which means, unfortunately, I had never experienced the pleasure of biscuits and gravy. In fact, I didn’t even know there was such thing as a breakfast-type gravy.
The first time I tasted biscuits and gravy was in Alabama while I was visiting Matthew for his officer training graduation. I ended up eating them just about every morning for a week.
When we moved to Mississippi, right after training, creating biscuits and gravy became a main goal of mine. The gravy part was easily mastered, but the biscuits have eluded me. I have been blessed with the talent of cooking and baking, but buttermilk biscuits have failed me time and time again. I finally created a recipe that seems to work, but I am still perfecting the technique. While I have enclosed the recipe for the biscuits, I will be playing around with it and perfecting it over the next several months.
Southern Biscuits and Gravy
Equipment
- pastry cutter
Ingredients
Buttermilk Biscuits
- 4 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tbsp baking powder
- ¾ tsp baking soda
- 4 tsp granulated sugar
- 2 tsp salt
- 12 tbsp unsalted butter cut into cubes
- 1½ cups whole milk
- 2 tbsp lemon juice fresh
Sausage Gravy
- 1 lb pork sausage
- ½ cup unsalted butter
- ¼ cup all-purpose flour
- 2 cups whole milk
- 2 tsp salt
- 2 tsp cracked black pepper
- 2 Tbsp Mike's Hot Honey
- 1 tbsp fresh sage chopped
- avocado oil or vegetable oil
Instructions
Buttermilk Biscuits
- Before you do anything else, cube the butter and place a bowl and then into the refrigerator. Then combine the whole milk and lemon juice, this is going to make your buttermilk. While you can use storebought buttermilk, I prefer to make it with milk and lemon juice. Once the milk and lemon juice have been combined, place that in the refrigerator as well. Also your pastry cutter…put it in the refrigerator too. There are two major tips for successful buttermilk biscuits, the first one is to make sure the butter, buttermilk, and pastry cutter are cold.
- While your butter, buttermilk, and pastry cutter are in the refrigerator, combine the rest of the ingredients in a large bowl. Whisk together to combine.
- Add in the cold butter to the dry ingredients and use the pastry cutter to combine the butter with the dry ingredients. You want the butter pieces to be around the size of a pea. BUT don't overwork the butter. The reason why buttermilk biscuits are flaky are the pockets of air the butter bits make while baking.
- When the butter has been cut into the dry ingredients, take the buttermilk (whole milk with lemon juice) and add into the bowl a ¼ of a cup at a time, while using a rubber spatula to mix together. Mix slowly in a sort of folding motion. When the milk has been added completely, mix the dough until it is mostly combined.
- Flour the surface of the counter top and place the mostly mixed dough on top. Kneed the dough together until the dough is barely combined. Roll out the dough to about ¼ of an inch, fold in half and roll out again, but to about ½ of an inch. Take a round cookie cutter and cut out biscuits. Try to cut as many as possible before having to reroll out the dough. The more you mess with the dough the more the butter will melt.
- Brush on some melted butter over the top of the biscuits and then place in a 425°preheated oven and bake for 15-20 minutes.
Sausage Gravy
- In a large skillet (I prefer my cast iron skillet), brown pork sausage and then when complete remove from skillet and place on a plate with paper towels.
- Add in ½ cup of butter and begin to melt. Once the butter is about halfway melted, add in the flour. You are going to be creating a roux with the butter and flour. Whisk the butter and flour together until combined.
- Pour in the milk and continue to whisk to combine.
- Season with salt, pepper, and Mike's Hot Honey. If you don't have Mike's Hot Honey, you can add in regular honey and a dash of hot sauce. Keep whisking.
- Add back in the sausage and stir to combine. Lastly, take off of heat and add in the fresh sage.
- Serving immediately over buttermilk biscuits.
Nutrition
The pastry cutter is definitely a must. Some buttermilk biscuit recipes say you can use a food processor, but I like to use the pastry cutter instead. While the pastry cutter takes more effort, the food processor can quickly heat up the butter which in turn causes the biscuits to not be as flaky.
Also, while the recipe doesn’t require Mike’s Hot Honey, it definitely adds a punch of flavor. If you don’t have Mike’s Hot Honey, you can substitute with regular honey or pure maple syrup and some hot sauce. But I’m telling you, Mike’s Hot Honey is the way to go!
Have you had biscuits and gravy before? If you haven’t yet tasted this glorious breakfast food, what the heck are you doing with your life? Hope y’all have an amazing week. Stay safe, hug your loved ones, and keep going.
