Foodie Friday-Beef Tips & Rice, Plus** The Cornbread Gospels

It's Friday and around many parts of Blogland, that means it is Gollum's Foodie Friday.

Today I want to share a crock pot meal, which can also be made in the oven. My aunt Wanda gave me this recipe, it is for Beef Tips and Rice. It is one of my husbands favorite meals, and it is so easy to prepare!

Beef Tips and Rice
Ingredients:
sirlion beef tips
1 package dry onion soup mix
1 cup water or sprite (I use water)
1 can beefy mushroom soup (I have also used golden mushroom)
1 can cream of chicken soup

Put beef tips in crock pot or casserole dish. Mix all other ingredietns together, Pour on top of beef tips. Bake at 325 degrees for 2 and 1/2 hours, or on low all day on crock pot. Serve over prepared minute rice. I serve this meal with greem beans and either rolls or cornbread.

Speaking of cornbread....Did you see my Southern Staples post last week on cornbread?
Well, low and behold, Ms Crescent Dragonwagon did! She is the author of a new cookbook titled, "The Cornbread Gospels". She sent me the cutest email that read,
"Hey, Leigh --- You had me from... "ain't no one that can serve it up like someone's momma or grandmomma" and "Let me declare that cornbread is not sweet." Honeychile, I spent six years writing a little something on the subject called The Cornbread Gospels. ! Seriously, not everyone who writes about cornbread knows what they're talking about --- I'm really tickled when I run across someone who does!
Warmly,
Crescent Dragonwagon

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Shortly thereafter, her cookbook arrived in the mail, the very one, The Cornbread Gospels. It is my new kitchen bible, for it indeed sings the praises of cornbread, in over 200 recipes. Newsflash-Cornbread is a religion to we southerners.
Written by someone who was "schooled" in southern cornbread in the state of Arkansas for 33 years,  It is steeped in our culture, in our raising and the root of many memories gathered 'round the supper table. And if for Heaven's sake, you haven't yet had a cast iron skilet of cornbread, then taste, and you too shall find religion in that bite of hearty ground corn and become a convert yourself. Also in the Cornbread Gospels you will find delightful commentary of stories, antedotes, history and cornbread lore. 
I have to share one of my favorite lines in the book, one that ironically is unrelated to cornbread but it southern culture in a nutshell, Dragonwagon writes, {using the nickname}" Honeychile", and my mother's social style is what I came to recognise as the classic manner in which southen women were (to some extent are) schooled: graceful, charming, genteel, effusive in thanks, indirect, quite certain (despite or because of this) to get their way, and capable of summing up others with wicked, deadly accuracy (generally onlu in private company, after a gin and tonic, or two)."
 
Oh, sooo true.
I want to extend my sincere thanks to Crescent Dragonwagon, for sharing your cookboook, The Cornbread Gospels, with me. I will cherish it always. I highly recommend it to others as a "kitchen bible". Preach on, my sista friend, Crescent, in the language that is heard by many but understood by all {southerners}...Food is love.
Sincere Appreciation for sharing your love with me! I am most touched. Leigh

 
To order your own copy of The Cornbread Gospels, click here.
It will make a wonderful gift to you or to someone you love.
 
Thanks for tuning into Foodie Friday.

Momma's Buttermillk Biscuits

Here in the south there are some things that just define the culture...

Some of those being the humidity (take note, southern women don't sweat, we "glisten")

The dialect (hun-neh and pah-dun, included)and especially important, the food.

And be quite certain there "ain't" no one that can serve it up like someone's momma or grandmomma. Those of you that were not lucky enough to be born in the south can cook like one, with the proper instructions, mind you.

Today we are going to examine some of those essential and defining southern dishes. Pretty soon, you will be serving up a slice of cornbread and sweet tea like a southern belle.

Ok, almost....we still need to work on that drawl.

In the meantime....the food.

Every Tuesday on my recipe blog, Plates and Places, I will introduce you to the fine art of southern cuisine... that being SOUTHERN STAPLES.

 

Last week we chatted up my Five Generation Cornbread Recipe.

Today, it's the biscuits.

There are so many types of buiscuits out there: buttermilk, drop biscuits, beaten and cat head to name a few. I grew up on butter milk biscuits. I remember Sunday mornings, often times mom would cook a big breakfast that included these. And if we were lucky, there would be left overs for lunch! Like my cornbread recipe, this biscuit recipe has been in the family for many many generations. My great grandma Idabell was taught by her mother, Idabell taught her daughter Buena, who taught her daughter Sharon, who in turn taught me to make these biscuits. One day I will teach my daughter how to prepare these simple, yet delicious and light tasteing biscuit.

Now my mother only made these as the recipe states below, however, I think it would be perfectly acceptable to experiement and add some rosemary and tyme, or some shredded cheese like cheddar or blue crumbles, even some garlic butter on top of the cooked biscuits as they come from the oven. That's all up to you. I like them as they are, hot from the oven with just a bit of butter and honey.

 

Momma's Buttermilk Biscuits

 

2 Cups self rising flour

1/3 C shortening

3/4 C buttermilk

 

Blend first 2 ingredients with a fork or your fingers, then add the buttermilk. Blend to a doughy consistency. Flour a cook board or a towel lightly, placing dough down and kneading three of four times (DO NOT OVER KNEAD! This goes in Biscuits and in Life. Know a good thing and leave it be.) Flatten out with rolling pin or by hand. Cut out biscuits with cutter, if you do not have one-use a juice glass that has been lightly floured on the rim, or may I recommend, just cutting the biscuits with a goo knife, in squares. Squares are perfect for holding things like country ham or sausage, and you do not waste any dough! Bake at 450 degrees for 10 to 12 minutes. Serve HOT!

 

Just a couple side notes:

I recall the first time I had ever had  cat head biscuit. If you aren't familiar, it's a really large biscuit, made by using a large cutter. I was at a festival at Arlington Antebellum Home , the line for these biscuits was out the door of the big antebelum home. Every year, the same thing. It seemed as I grew, the biscuits became smaller. My mother agreed. I recall them being as big as a slarge saucer or mall dinner plate.

 

One of my most favorite books is A Painted House, by John Grisham. Set in the late summer and early fall of 1952, its story is told through the eyes of seven-year-old Luke Chandler, the youngest in a family of cotton farmers struggling to harvest their crop and earn enough to settle their debts. The novel portrays the experiences that bring him from a world of innocence into one of harsh reality. It is a great and easy read, I highly recommend it. I will say though, as I read this book, I yearned for biscuits the entire time. You will see why. If you read it, let me know what you think!

 

Come back later this week- I have a great new cookbook recommendation! I LOVE it! It's my new "Kitchen Bible"! You'll see why.....(Thanks, Cresent Dragonwagon!!)