Friday, April 10, 2009

Red-Eye Gravy 4.9.09

We had breakfast for dinner tonight...a good, ole Southern, country-style breakfast in fact, consisting of Fried Ham, Scrambled Eggs, Grits with Red-Eye Gravy and hot, fluffy Buttermilk Biscuits.

I'm sure you already know how to scramble eggs (Jen, you're quite good at it!) so I'm going to tell you about the Ham and Red-Eye Gravy. Cut a nice ham steak (preferably one with a bit of fat) into serving size pieces. Melt a couple tablespoons of Crisco in an iron skillet -you cannot make Red-Eye Gravy in anything else and have it come out right- and fry the ham pieces until they've browned a bit and the ham has flavored the "drippings" (aka Grease. Yeah I know...it sounds really gross, but it tastes so good!). Remove the ham to a plate and keep it warm. Sprinkle 1/2 to 1 tsp sugar into the skillet and then pour in about 1 cup of strong coffee and stir to loosen the ham particles. Bring it to a boil and cook a few minutes to reduce it a bit, then add the ham back to the pan, turn the heat to low and just keep it warm till the rest of dinner is ready. Spoon the gravy over the grits to serve. It's also very tasty when you "sop" a biscuit in it. Yum!

For the grits, just follow the directions on the back of the package (add salt for God's sake!) or use Instant Grits, which taste just fine to me! I am one of those unfortunate people who's never gotten the hang of making biscuits from scratch but I highly recommend the FROZEN ones (NOT the ones in the dairy section that come in a can!) from Pillsbury - Buttermilk or Southern Style. They are a very good substitute for Granny's home-made biscuits. Just follow the instructions on the package to bake them for the minimum amount of time.

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