Let’s Make Biscuits!
With so many folks at home, many of us are spending more time in the kitchen. Thomas Wolfe wrote about the decadent breakfasts he shared with his family as a young child at his father’s house. In Look Homeward, Angel, he recalls, “In the morning they rose in a house pungent with breakfast cookery, and they sat at a smoking table loaded with brains and eggs, ham, hot biscuit, fried apples seething in their gummed syrups, honey, golden butter, fried steak, scalding coffee.”
Life was different in his mother’s house. In the Old Kentucky Home boardinghouse where Thomas Wolfe’s mother was known for her frugality, common recipes were likely those that yielded large quantities at a relatively cheap cost. We looked for inexpensive breakfast ideas in our very own cookbook Papa Loved Hot Biscuits and Cornbread, which is a compilation of recipes borrowed from Julia Wolfe and Tom’s sister Mabel Wolfe Wheaton. Putting aside the thought of fried brains, it is true that no southern breakfast table would be complete without hot biscuits. Let us follow Thomas Wolfe’s family recipe and make biscuits together.
Our recipe calls for:
- 2 cups bread flour*
- 4 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 tbsp. shortening (or double this for a richer biscuit)
- ¾–1 cup of milk (or use half milk and half water)
Preheat your oven to 450 degrees.
*Note- all-purpose flour will work fine.
Step 1: Measure your flour, baking powder, and salt directly into the sifter, and sift away to get rid of any lumps. Our recipe recommends you sift twice for an extra fluffy biscuit.
Step 2: To the flour mixture, add in 2 (or 4) tablespoons of lard. Butter would likely also work, but today I’m using good old fashioned Crisco. To cut in the Crisco, our recipe recommends using a fork or knife, but hands are equally efficient and pretty darn fast. Don’t be afraid to get a little messy!
Step 3: Once the Crisco is nicely blended into the flour- evenly distributed with no large lumps- add in your milk. I did mine about a ½ cup at a time. You can always add more liquid as needed. You want everything to come together with no obvious dry bits of flour mixture left in the bowl. Prepare to get a little goopy! It should look like this:
Step 4: The recipe recommends you knead the dough for about 10 minutes. If you don’t have an old fashioned dough bowl (like Julia’s), spreading flour evenly across a clean work surface or kitchen countertop will still get the job done just fine! Knead until the biscuit dough forms a nice ball and should no longer be sticky.
Step 5: Sprinkle a little flour on top of the dough and across your rolling pin, and start to roll out the biscuit dough. Ideally you want the dough rolled to about ½ to ¾ inch thick.
Step 6: Butter the bottom of the baking sheet pan you’re going to use.*
*Note: most baking sheet pans become “seasoned” and discolored over time and after rigorous use, so please don’t be alarmed
Step 7: Using a biscuit cutter (or even a drinking glass will work), cut out your biscuits. Re-roll out the scraps to continue cutting biscuits with the available dough. This recipe called for 12–15 biscuits, and I was able to get 14.
Step 8: Place your biscuits on your sheet pan so that each biscuit is touching, and put them in the hot even. The biscuits should bake for about 15 minutes, but check after 12 minutes or so to make sure the tops aren’t getting too brown.
Step 9: Once you’ve pulled them out of the oven, admire your hard work while they cool. You can brush the tops with butter if you like.
Step 10: Now it’s time to enjoy! Break open a biscuit and spread on your favorite jam or jelly. Today, I used apple butter! Once cooled completely, these can be stored in a Ziploc bag for a couple of days so they won’t dry out.
