Fudge, More Fudge, Butterscotch and Potato Candy

Mr. Smith and I met when I was 38 and he was 37. We were both set in our ways, we still are, quite frankly. Over the course of the last 4.5 years, we have found ways to resolve most of our differences. Some of them just have to remain unresolved. There are certain topics we can't discuss (for example, if Abraham Lincoln was a good president or a traitor. Also our arguments about O.J. Simpson have been known to clear rooms of all other occupants).

Doesn't he just creep you out?

One of the things that we will never agree on is Alton Brown. Mr. Smith loves his show on The Food Network. I believe he belongs on The Science Channel or SciFi, but most certainly NOT on The Food Network! I will not refer to it as a cooking show, since he so rarely cooks.

Mr. Brown (I usually refer to him as Anus, much to Mr. Smith's chagrin. I tell Mr. Smith that Alton's real name is Anus, but he had to change his name because no one would buy a cookbook from some guy named Anus Brown. I think I am funny. Other people do not) does little skits, cutesy junk with the camera and too much science for a cooking show. He is annoying in the extreme and I hate him.

Before I met Mr. Smith, I had never even heard of this clown. Now his science geek ass is clogging up my TiVo. To the tune of 200 GB of his idiotic show. I can feel my hackles go up every time I am looking for one of my shows and have to scroll past this endless list of his blathering shows on how to buy a deep frying apparatus. BORING!!

Mr. Smith is religious in his devotion to this fool. I, on the other hand, wish his show would get cancelled and he would be silenced by some tawdry scandal involving hookers and drugs. Alas, he will not go away. In fact, they keep rolling him into more and more shows. He does ads for grape juice and has cookbooks, he pedals grape juice for Pete's sake!

Now, as if all of that weren't enough, he is plugging his latest book in Family Circle.

I noticed this recipe and was interested. Not because it is my arch enemy, Alton Brown, but because I am always interested in good biscuit recipe.

So, as a little surprise for Mr. Smith, I made these to have with our roasted turkey and gravy the other night.

I have to tell you, they are better than I thought they would be. I may even consider replacing my old, tried and true biscuit recipe. These are light and fluffy, worth a little extra work.

Okay, so now, I am officially a complete loser. It has taken me so long to post this that I actually caved in and used another one of this chucklehead's recipes.

Don't get me wrong, I still can't stand him. Nothing has changed in that department. He is a pretentious windbag.

So, at Mr. Smith's request, I made Alton's Chocolate Fudge. I have always found it a bit redundant to say Chocolate Fudge, but that is just like Alton, isn't it?

Here is the recipe.

A warning here: Candy making is not for the faint of heart. As my belovedly blunt Aunt JoAnna said, "It is bullshit. Too much work and not enough in the way of results." You can embark on the little endeavor, feeling pretty confident, feeling sassy, like you have the world by the tail. Then the weather isn't just right, or you are an idiot and you use condensed milk instead of evaporated milk (okay, that was just me) and the whole thing turns into a cinder block. It can be really heartbreaking. Maybe I am just too sensitive to failures, another thing I need to work on...great!

Over the last several days, I have been bitten by some kind of candy-making bug. I do not recommend it. It is really time consuming, tiring, and as my Aunt JoAnna said, "Not very rewarding." Sure, you get the satisfaction of that little "WOW" factor when you tell people that you went all Martha Stewart and made your own candy. But two hours of stirring for about 20 pieces of candy, to quote JoAnna, is "Bullshit."

This week I have made four batches of Cream Butterscotch (recipe coming soon), three batches of Fudge (two different recipes...don't ask) and one batch of Potato Candy (also, recipe on the way). I can't even tell you why I am doing this, but I seem unable to stop myself.

Mr. Smith LOVES the Alton Brown Fudge (of course) so now I probably be stuck making it all the time. I have to admit, it is really pretty good. Mr. Smith would like me to use it to frost a cake. We will have to see about that one.

A little extra something extra to consider for your fudge (or any chocolate recipes, for that matter) King Arthur Espresso Powder. Gives it a little something extra that is just wonderful.

Back to the kitchen to churn out more candy!

Baking Powder Biscuits

My mother and I have this long running argument (she calls it a discussion) about biscuits. I like to make rolled biscuits that are cut out. I just love the way they look, they split perfectly for buttering, etc. They puff up so beautifully in the oven. It just makes me happy to seem them lined up on the cookie sheet. Just getting barely golden on the bottom.

My mother, on the other hand, is a firm believer in drop biscuits. More free form, less work, less clean up. To me, they are too haphazard. They don't split well for eating with chicken and gravy, they bake unevenly, etc.

This has been going on forever and will never be resolved. Since I do the cooking, I make the rolled biscuits. So that is that, as they say.

My grandmother always used a water glass to cut the biscuits. Recently, I have started doing the same thing. I don't have to dig through thousands of cookie cutters looking for the right size round cookie cutter. Besides, I kind of like being the one to carry on her tradition.

The most beautiful part of these, the endless variations: Bacon Biscuits (!!!), Buttermilk Biscuits, Cheese Biscuits, Crusty Rich Biscuits.

I make these for Christmas dinner. I usually make them for Thanksgiving. I make them when we have Chicken, Gravy and Biscuits. So, here it is. The Baking Powder Biscuit recipe. Use it in semi-good health!

Baking Powder Biscuits

1 3/4 + 2 Tablespoons flour

3 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup shortening

3/4 cup milk

Blend flour, baking powder and salt.

Cut in shortening with a pastry blender. (By the way, click on the link and buy yourself one of these from The Pampered Chef. It is just the best one I have ever used. Our last one, seriously...lethal weapon.)

Add milk. Stir with a fork until all ingredients are moistened. Turn the dough out onto a floured board.

Knead gently 20 times.

Roll dough into 1/2-inch thickness.

Cut with floured 2-inch biscuit cutter (or cookie cutter or a glass if the mood strikes)

Place on ungreased cookie sheet.

Bake at 450° for 8-10 minutes. Don't do what I do and wander off and forget you have biscuits in the oven. They aren't nearly as good when the bottoms are black and smoky.

Now for the mouth watering variation:

Bacon Biscuits

Fry 4 slices of bacon until crisp. Drain well. Cut into small pieces. Prepare the Baking Powder Biscuits as directed above except add bacon pieces to biscuit mixture after shortening. Complete the recipe as directed.

Buttermilk Biscuits

Prepare Baking Powder Biscuits as directed above, except add 1/4 teaspoon of baking soda to dry ingredients. Substitute 3/4 cup buttermilk or sour milk for sweet milk. Complete recipe as directed.

Cheese Biscuits

Prepare Baking Powder Biscuits as directed above, except cut 3/4 cup of grated sharp cheese into biscuit mixture after shortening. Complete recipe as directed.

Crusty Rich Biscuits

Prepare Baking Powder Biscuits as directed above except increase shortening to 1/3 cup. Complete recipe, but roll dough to 1/4-inch thickness.

Drop Biscuits

Prepare Baking Powder Biscuits as directed except increase flour to 2 cups and milk to 1 cup. Combine ingredients as directed.

Drop by tablespoonfuls onto ungreased baking sheet.

Bake at 450°for 12-15 minutes.

Yield: 1 dozen biscuits.

Chicken, Gravy and Biscuits

Left to right: Grace, Alice and Hilda (my grandmother) circa 1938.

Don't the look they The Three Graces?(thanks Wikipedia.org!)

This recipe is one of the perennial favorites in our house.

I have very fond memories of my great aunt Alice making this when we stopped to see her one day. You could just tell she would have made this meal if we were coming or not. A hot meal at lunch time was THAT important to her. We were just stopping in for a visit, but she insisted that we stay for a meal. Well, she earned my eternal admiration when she pulled out all the stops and served up Chicken, Gravy and Biscuits.

She was a truly great lady. She did not believe in dry cleaning. She figured if you couldn't wash it in the washer and dry on the clothes line or in a dryer, it wasn't worth having. I loved her a great deal. She was no nonsense. She baked her biscuits on a cake pan turned upside down. Oh how I loved finding that out!

She also did the New York Times Crossword Puzzle every Sunday...in INK! I actually witnessed her, sitting and working intently until she got the whole thing done. She was so dedicated and did not even look up until she had that think licked. We all just sat around talking while she toiled away.

She was married to Jimmy who was my grandfather's dearest friend. Jimmy was a bit of a troublemaker and a bit of a rabble rouser. He refused to use a map. He believed the compass was good enough. He called my Aunt Alice "Sally."

They were one of those couples that you see walking, and even though they are pushing eighty, they are still holding hands. And they are holding hands because they want to, not because they need to. I love love love those couples.

I can only hope that Mr. Smith and I are lucky enough to end up that way. That is the plan, anyway.

So, here's the deal.

Get yourself some chicken. You can start with raw chicken, if you are feeling terribly industrious. If you don't have much time, or you hate dealing with raw chicken, go get a rotisserie chicken at the grocery store. It works just fine and cuts your prep time to virtually nothing.

You can use this method to cook the chicken.

It is so handy and can be done well in advance. Just get some heavy duty foil, put it on a cookie sheet, add some carrots, celery and onion. Peel the carrots, get a few stalks of celery and cut the onion into nice size chunks, nothing fancy. Make a "raft" in the center of the foil. Put the raw, skinless, boneless chicken breasts on top of the vegetables.

Seal up the foil so that you have a nice packet. Place in a 350 degree oven for about 45 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through. You will have some beautiful broth, some nicely steamed veggies and some cooked chicken ready to use in any number of ways.

You can go ahead and use it for Chicken a la King, which I highly recommend you try. Very nice for a large group.

Or you can just cut up the chicken, make yourself some gravy and serve it over biscuits. You can even use the herb biscuit recipe that Emeril used with the Chicken a la King.

This gravy recipe is pretty much fool proof. I have doubled it, I use it for Mr. Smith's Turkey Pot Pie, we have it every Thanksgiving.

It is unfortunately called Zippity Doo Dah Gravy. I didn't name it.

4 Tablespoons margarine

4 Tablespoons flour

2 cups water

2 teaspoons Chicken Better Than Buillion

Melt the margarine in a medium saucepan. Stir the flour in to make a nice roux. Wisk in the water and then add the buillion. Just keep stirring it until it thickens to the consistency that you like. Some people like thicker gravy. My father, heaven help me, likes thin gravy. Don't ask me why.

Once you have your gravy, cut up your chicken and stir it into the gravy. Are you getting hungry yet?

Now all you need is your very favorite baking powder biscuits, baked to perfection.

Split one or two of those babies and spoon the Chicken and Gravy over them.

After you swoon and recover, eat, enjoy and wax poetic about how wonderful simple food can be.

You are welcome!