I am always trying to find ways to make our favorite recipes healthier and not have my husband notice that his favorite meal has been changed. This is not easy because, I swear the man’s calling in life was to be a food critic (he missed his calling, he is pretending to be a scientist). He can tell when I have changed one tiny little thing and especially hates it when I take light, flakey white flour biscuits and insert whole grains.
He hates whole grains.
But I do it anyway, it’s for his own good.
So he wasn’t to excited about these biscuits but I was. I LOVE whole grains. I love the texture, the flavor and the fact that it is so much better for you.
A few months ago I decided to the book, “Nourishing Traditions” my Aunt had given to my mom a long time ago and that was where I had first seen it (and nearly stole it before mom had a chance to look at it). It an incredibly informative book with amazingly delicious and healthy recipes. If you are familiar with Weston A. Price, it’s right there in that same genre of nutrition.
Whole, real nutrient dense foods.
It’s awesome.
So on Friday, I decided to menu plan for the weekend and thought through what we would likely eat, I have been making biscuits and gravy on saturday mornings lately because the is my husband’s favorite breakfast and it’s easy to make and the kids mostly like it.
So after thinking through my menu, I ground up some grains and set them to soak (here is an article on why you should soak your grains) so they would be all ready for the morning. It worked wonderfully and I left the breakfast table feeling satisfied, healthy and ready to start the day.
My poor husband left somewhat dis-gruntled but admitted they were by far the best whole grain biscuits I have ever made. They were incredibly light and fluffy, not so much flakey as we are used to with a white flour biscuit but they tasted amazing and had awesome texture and were seriously the easiest biscuits I have ever made. No cutting in cold butter!
I have been eating the leftover ones slathered with butter since then and I am in love.
I don’t know what I’ll do next weekend. Who will get their choice of biscuit? Hmmmm…..
If you do not have a grain grinder to make your own fresh flour, see if you can find someone who does or just get the freshest flour you can find. My sister-in-law used to get freshly milled flour from Azure Standard.
Or if you prefer, here is a recipe for all-purpose flour biscuits that are amazing and are what my husband would have preferred I make (it’s an older recipe that I need to re-shoot the photo now that my photography skills have improved so please ignore the photo for now…)
FOR THE BISCUITS- 3½ cups freshly ground spelt, kamut or whole wheat flour
- 1¼ cup buttermilk (I used whey from yogurt making)
- 4 tablespoons melted butter or lard
- 1½ teaspoons sea salt
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- a little flour for kneading
FOR THE GRAVY - 1 pound sausage
- ½ cup flour
- 2 cups milk
- sea salt and freshly ground pepper
- First thing to do, the day before you want to actually make the biscuits, is to combine the flour with the buttermilk to make a thick dough, cover and leave in a warm place for 12-24 hours.
- In the morning, preheat the oven to 350˚ then place the dough in your food processor and run for a couple minutes until the dough becomes soft, loose and sticky, if you are an expert biscuit maker you will doubt what is happening at this point but trust me.
- Add the remaining ingredients and run the processor until blended.
- Turn the very sticky dough out onto a well floured surface, sprinkle a little flour on top and knead a few times until the dough comes together and is smooth.
- Roll out the biscuits, or use your hands to press the dough to ¾ inch thickness and cut out with a 2" biscuit cutter. Place the biscuits on a grease baking sheet or use a baking mat.
- Bake for about 20-25 minutes or until slightly browned.
- While the biscuits are baking, make the gravy. In a medium fry pan over medium high heat, brown the sausage and break it up into small pieces with your spoon or spatula. Once the sausage is cooked and no pink remains, add the flour and stir to coat the sausage in it.
- Next add the milk a little at a time, about 3-4 tablespoons in each addition and stir until thickened. Keep adding milk until the desired consistency is achieved (in fact you will want to make it just a little bit looser than you think you will want it because it always continues thickening after it cools).
- Add salt and pepper to taste and serve over the biscuits.
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