There are times when you have that beautiful pot of soup simmering on the stove but the day suddenly overwhelms you. The bread remains in your dreams and you need something to round out your soup supper. Biscuits aren’t limited to the breakfast scene. And, believe it or not, the ordinary biscuit is teeming with possibilities.
Everyday Biscuits
4 cups all-purpose flour
4 ½ teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons salt
2/3 cup shortening
1 ½ cups milk, approximately
Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Combine the dry ingredients. Mix in the shortening with a pastry cutter or fork. It should look like coarse meal. Slowly add the milk, mixing the batter gently with a fork until a soft dough is formed. Take half the dough and knead on a floured surface until smooth. Not too long! Just until it loses it’s stickiness. Roll out lightly to about 1/2-inch thick. Cut into circles using a cookie cutter or a glass. Repeat with remaining dough. Bake on lightly-greased baking sheet for approximately 15 minutes or until golden. Makes about two dozen biscuits.
Biscuits go well with just about any kind of soup. You don’t have to make due with plain biscuits all the time. Biscuits adapt well to added ingredients. Think about what you are serving them with and enhance them with a bit of your own ideas.
Cheese Biscuits can happen with a cup of grated cheese added to the dough. Cheddar is best but Feta is interesting.
Herb Biscuits will take any dry herb or spice that will be compatible with your main course. Dried dill biscuits go well with chicken soup. Thyme and Rosemary are surprisingly good with a heartier, beef soup or stew.
If you need dessert, biscuits can rescue you again. Add a cup of granulated sugar to the above biscuit mix and sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar before baking. A plain bowl of ice cream increases in value when there is a warm, sweet biscuit along side it.
Depending on how your mornings go, nothing gets the family up like the scent of baking biscuits. I loved sleeping in when I was younger . . . but I loved biscuits more! Sometimes I would carefully dribble maple syrup on them. Other times, they clamored for a pat of butter and a spoonful of jam. No matter how grey and drizzly the day, a cozy kitchen and hot biscuits revealed the warmth of my mother’s love. Baking biscuits makes memories and certainly brings back memories. It is never so much the actual food but the time and thought that brought it to the table.
My father got himself in trouble with his favorite aunt over biscuits. We would often visit on a Saturday and stay for one of Aunt Jo’s wonderful lunches. I always remember the line up of glasses at my place, a glass of milk, one of orange juice and another of water. Hot biscuits were always a part of whatever she was serving. One time she complained that no one ever mentioned her homemade biscuits. She was feeling overworked and under loved! Keeping this conversation in mind, the next time we visited, my father praised her biscuits to the skies. After his fourth or fifth flowery remark on her culinary expertise when it came to biscuits, Aunt Jo had to admit something. She had been in a hurry that day and the biscuits were from a package.
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