How to Make Buttermilk Biscuits and Sausage Gravy - Cooking like Paula Deen

Southern comfort foods always include biscuits and gravy, a breakfast staple in the South. There is really no secret to making a good gravy, but the biscuits require a little bit of care. Nothing is worse than a flat, tough biscuit. The trick is how you add the butter. Yes, butter. You can't make southern food without butter.

Ingredients

• 1 lb. ground sausage
• 1/2 cup diced onions
• 2 Tablespoons all purpose flour
• 1 cup milk
• salt and pepper to taste

Directions

1. Brown ground sausage.
   
2. Stir in onions and saute until tender.
   
3. Stir in the all purpose flour until mixture resembles a thick paste.
   
4. Add milk a little at a time stirring constantly until the gravy thickens.
5. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
   
6. Serve over homemade buttermilk biscuits.

The secret to light and fluffy biscuits is to grate very cold butter into the dry mixture, and then carefully and quickly work it in without allowing the butter to melt.

Ingredients

• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1/3 cup very cold butter
• 3/4 cup buttermilk
• 1/4 cup melted butter.

Directions

1. Heat oven to 450 F.
   
2. Stir together dry ingredients.
   
3. Grate the cold butter (using a cheese grater) into the dry ingredients. Cut the the grated butter into the dry mixture using a pastry blender or your hands until the mixture is coarse. Don't over mix, you don't want the butter to melt.
   
4. Stir in the buttermilk using a fork just until moistened.
   
5. Turn out onto a floured bread board, knead a few times, then roll out with a pin to 1/3 inch thick. Cut into biscuits, place on ungreased baking sheet.
   
6. Brush the tops with melted butter and bake for 10 to 12 minutes, until biscuits are nicely browned.
7. Serve with sausage gravy.