Recipe: Biscuits and Sawmill Gravy (using ground pork sausage)

BISCUITS AND SAWMILL GRAVY

"If you ask me really how you can get a cookbook published, make sure there's a cookbook editor in your friend's kitchen when you bring over your offering for a potluck supper. This is the recipe that will definitely seduce that editor into publishing your cookbook, because it is so divine. I promise!"

3 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup vegetable shortening
1 to 1 1/4 cups milk
1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
Sawmill Gravy (recipe follows)

Heat oven to 450 degrees F.

In a bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Cut in the vegetable shortening until it looks like coarse meal. Add the milk a little at a time, stirring constantly until well-mixed.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Knead lightly two or three times. Roll out the dough with a floured rolling pin to 1/2-inch thickness. Cut with a 2-inch biscuit cutter. Place biscuits in a large greased cast-iron skillet. Brush biscuits with half the melted butter.

Bake for 12 to 14 minutes or until golden brown. Brush hot biscuits with remaining butter. Split biscuits in half, and ladle on Sawmill Gravy.

Makes about 1 dozen biscuits

SAWMILL GRAVY

1 pound ground pork sausage
4 slices thick-cut bacon, diced
1/2 medium onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons ground black pepper
2 cups half-and-half
2 tablespoons butter

Heat a large skillet for 1 minute or 2 over medium heat. Combine sausage, bacon, onion and garlic. Cook until sausage is browned and bacon cooked, breaking up sausage with a wooden spoon into crumbles.

Stir in the flour, salt and pepper, cook for 1 minute or 2. Gradually stir in the half-and-half. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until mixture thickens. Stir in the butter until well-blended. Add more milk or half-and-half if gravy seems too thick.

Source: It Ain't All About the Cookin' by Paula Deen