One of the fun/maybe insane things about eating and cooking a lot is the eventual formation of strong opinions about minute topics, such as the thin vs thick burger debate, Antico pizza (I’ve had a good one or two, but I’m generally against it), whether or not you should buttermilk soak fried chicken (and can you combine the brine + soak phase??), and the constant wondering if perhaps gluten free claimants are full of it.
What constitutes a proper biscuit falls into this category, and I’ll be the first to admit, I don’t have a strong background in this area. I didn’t grow up with my grandmother’s biscuits, and my Yankee parents prefer a buttered English muffin.
But I’ve had some excellent biscuits, and I’m learning what I appreciate in a biscuit. I’ll also fess up and say that I’ve never made one I believe to be outstanding. I need work in the kitchen, but first, determining what the ultimate biscuit is to me is required for benchmarking.
I like them buttery, crisp on top, noticeable salt, and I don’t like them sweet. They should be rich and a little fluffy, definitely not dry, but not cake-ey or too puffed up for no reason, though an oversized fluffy biscuit can be a superior vehicle for sausage gravy. A good sandwich biscuit won’t fall apart, and isn’t doughy and raw in the middle, which can turn to biscuit glue, nearly impossible to un–cement from the roof of the mouth. But other than that, I’m not too picky about it.
I may prefer the biscuit at Red Eyed Mule overall, an ethereal, fluffy version, but the version at Beaver Creek Barbecue is quite the specimen. It’s also a better option for a breakfast sandwich.
I immensely enjoy these country cooking type of places, and don’t understand why anyone would go to Cracker Barrel or other corporate garbage when these mom and pop places exist around Atlanta, at prices frequently below Waffle House.
Beaver Creek has BBQ for lunch, and while I expect it to be simple and straight forward, I betcha it’s country strong. The fried chicken and egg biscuit I had was perfection.
Side bonus – watch Alton Brown make biscuits with Shatner. He gets pretty personal and I thought this was quite interesting. Alton Brown published this as a Podcast and it’s quite extended vs the video and you can listen to Shatner bitch at some of the production staff during the audio recording, which is fun.