Biscuits and gravy: Difference between revisions
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==History== |
==History== |
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Although the [[American English]] and [[British English]] use the same word for ''biscuit'' to refer to two distinctly different modern edible foods, early hard biscuits (North American: [[cookies]]), were derived from or as a storable version of [[bread]].<ref name=FTL>{{citeweb|url=http://www.foodtimeline.org/foodcookies.html|Biscuits & Cookies|publisher=Food Timeline|accessdate=201-01-15}}</ref> |
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Early [[European]] settlers in the United States brought with them a simpler and easy style of cooking, most often based on meat, ground wheat and warmed with gravy. After the first [[pigs]] were carried from England to [[Jamestown, Virginia]] in 1608, they became popular as a home grown edible animal.<ref name=FTL/> |
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The meal emerged as a distinct regional dish post the [[American War of Independence]], when stocks of food stuffs were in short supply. Breakfast was necessarily the most substantial meal of the day in the south, for a person facing a day of work on the plantations.<ref name=FTL/> While everyone wanted someone different and distinct from the British, the lack of supplies and money meant it also had to be cheap.<ref name=FTL/> |
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| ⚫ | Pigs were a popular food animal to keep at home, so cooks used the various products available from its processing to there full extent. Grease from cooked bacon or sausage was turned into white gravy, using flour, milk and water. Easy and quick to make [[buttermilk biscuits]] were cooked and served with the gravy for a filling and tasty meal. |
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==Variations== |
==Variations== |
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Revision as of 20:21, 15 January 2010
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Biscuits and gravy is a popular breakfast meal amongst people of the American South, Midwest, and Northwest.
It consists of soft dough biscuits covered in thick "country" or "white" gravy, made from the drippings of cooked pork sausage, white flour, milk, and often (but not always) bits of real sausage, bacon, ground beef, or other meat. The gravy is often flavored with black pepper. In some parts of the southern United States this is also called sawmill gravy.
History
Although the American English and British English use the same word for biscuit to refer to two distinctly different modern edible foods, early hard biscuits (North American: cookies), were derived from or as a storable version of bread.[1]
Early European settlers in the United States brought with them a simpler and easy style of cooking, most often based on meat, ground wheat and warmed with gravy. After the first pigs were carried from England to Jamestown, Virginia in 1608, they became popular as a home grown edible animal.[1]
The meal emerged as a distinct regional dish post the American War of Independence, when stocks of food stuffs were in short supply. Breakfast was necessarily the most substantial meal of the day in the south, for a person facing a day of work on the plantations.[1] While everyone wanted someone different and distinct from the British, the lack of supplies and money meant it also had to be cheap.[1]
Pigs were a popular food animal to keep at home, so cooks used the various products available from its processing to there full extent. Grease from cooked bacon or sausage was turned into white gravy, using flour, milk and water. Easy and quick to make buttermilk biscuits were cooked and served with the gravy for a filling and tasty meal.
Variations
While biscuits and gravy generally refers to sausage gravy, in Indiana egg gravy is more popular, made in one of two ways:
- by scrambling eggs in bacon grease, then adding flour and milk to make gravy, and adding crumbled bacon back to the mixture
- by making a basic roux, creating a brown gravy base, then whisking beaten eggs into the boiling gravy
Tomato gravy is white gravy mixed with crushed or diced tomatoes.
Geography
Biscuits and gravy is a distinctly Aouthern American meal, most popular in the Bible Belt. Although not popular in Florida, it can be found in the Carolinas, Georgia, Louisiana, Tennessee and north into Indiana and Ohio.
Biscuits and gravy may typically be ordered as an side item ("half order", usually a single biscuit) or the main course ("full order", usually two biscuits).
See also
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