Hello Thread # 3 !
A Couple of Secrets From Country Cooks
The secret to making good, light, fluffy biscuits is to not handle the dough too much and to make the dough more on the moist side than the dry side. The more moist the dough, the lighter the biscuits.
The secret to making good dumplings is to roll out the dumplings and cut them and then let them sit for a few minutes before dropping them in the cooking pot. This allows the air to slightly dry the outer surface of the dumplings and then they won’t fall apart when they hit the hot liquid.
Anytime you can use buttermilk instead of sweet milk in bread, the bread will rise lighter and fluffier.
Never use liquid oil when making bread. You’ll end up with hard, flat dough.
Spoon Bread
SOPPERS & GRAVY
A traditional bread in the Blue Ridge is spoon bread. When mountain cooks were in a hurry and just cooking for family, spoon bread fit the menu.
Spoon bread is essentially the same batter as biscuit, except that it is more moist. Use self-rising flour, solid shortening and buttermilk. They are the only ingredients necessary.
Put 3 cups flour in a large mixing bowl. Make a depression in the middle of the flour. Put a lump of shortening in it the size of a black walnut. Pour buttermilk in the depression and start stirring in the flour closest to the center, working out to the bowl. If the batter looks too dry, add a little more milk. The batter should be sticky but not liquid.
At this point you have two options as to how you want to cook your bread. You can grease and heat a cast iron skillet and cook it on top of a stove or in a fire place, on top of hot coals. You can also grease a baking pan and bake it in a 400 degree oven. The more moist the batter, the higher and lighter your bread will be, but if your batter is more moist it will take a little longer to bake. A tip to make the bread look smooth on top is to wet the top with a little water and smooth the batter with the back of a spoon.
It will take about 15 or 20 minutes to cook.
When done, turn it out onto a plate. No need to slice it, just break off the size hunk you want. It makes great “soppers.” Soppers are also a tradition. Soppers are bread broken up in small pieces. They are used to “sop” up gravy, primarily, but are also dropped in a glass of sweet or butter milk and eaten with a spoon.
GRAVY
Now if I give you a recipe for gravy, you’ll have a complete depression meal that many a mountain family has survived on in the past.
Many people associate gravy with meat but while grease is an essential ingredient, it’s all you need. You can save your bacon grease and make gravy from it. Many old timers made gravy just from lard.
Heat about 4 tablespoons of bacon or sausage grease in a cast iron skillet over a medium heat. When it is melted, add salt and pepper to taste. Stir in about an equal amount of flour and blend it so there are no lumps of dry flour. Continue until this mixture bubbles.
If you cook this mixture longer the gravy will be browner. Add one and a half to two cups of sweet milk slowly, stirring continuously to prevent lumping. Stir the gravy with a large spoon so that the backside of the spoon is rubbing the bottom of the skillet at all times. Make sure you stir all areas of the bottom of the skillet to prevent sticking. When it gets as thick as you like it, remove from heat and pour over “soppers.”
Granny says to add beer to the batter.
Anytime you can use buttermilk instead of sweet milk in bread, the bread will rise lighter and fluffier.
Never use liquid oil when making bread. You’ll end up with hard, flat dough.<<<
The oil may be the reason that folks do not like their bread machine bread.
On the buttermilk, you can make your own, use a cultured butter milk and add it to sweet milk, leave it out till it is soured, a few hours or overnight, in a warm spot, like yogurt, it will keep going, batch, add a cup to a quart of new milk and powdered will work.
Next time you make pancakes, use beer for the liquid and the pancakes will float in the air.
All are good tips, thanks for sharing them.
And if you are hatching eggs, feed the new babies with buttermilk for the first week and then add a dish of water to the cage.
Makes for a healthy bird/poultry.
I just stumbled upon your spoonbread recipe. Thank you! I haven’t had any since my grandmother died, and I moved away from the Blue Ridge in the early 80s. I can’t wait to try it.
My parents were vegetarians, but were both southerners, so gravy was a necessity. I learned to make gravy with butter or oil and get good flavor with seasonings and leftover "pot liquor" from cooking. Meat gravy is a snap after that.
Staying at my soon-to-be-in-laws house I offered to make sausage gravy for my FIL. My husband was VERY concerned since he was well aware of my vegetarian background. Warned me that gravy was a religion with his dad. I loved the look on his face when he saw his dad scarfing that gravy down.
gravy ping