Food Friday: Buttermilk Biscuit Day is coming up

(Photo courtesy of Home Baking Association)

Not to worry.

Even though May 14 is National Buttermilk Biscuit Day, I’m not going to get all overwrought.

Not going to tell you all about watching my grandmother bake biscuits from scratch and memory when I was little. Not going to get all poetic about eating half a home-baked biscuit while melted butter and honey runs down my arm. Not even going to mention sausage gravy.

I’m at work, folks, and trying to maintain a little decorum.

But I am going to let you in on the ground floor of a venture I’ve pondered a little, and that’s founding the National Biscuit Hall of Fame. Because there are tons of people out there who swear they know someone, or are kin to someone, who bakes the finest biscuits in the history of mankind. The finest.

So why would we not want to honor all those people? When we get all their pictures on the walls, it’ll be Mommas, Grandmas, Nanas and PopPops; school cafeteria ladies; military and firehouse cooks; church ladies; and whoever was in the kitchen that night in 2002 when I dined at The Loveless Cafe in Nashville—biscuit bakers of all ages and shapes and colors, with flour on their hands and magic in their kitchens.

And as visitors gaze at those portraits, they’ll swear they can smell a batch of biscuits coming out of the oven that very minute.

And they’ll be right.

Because the only way out will be through the diner.

If you’re a potential Biscuit Hall of Fame nominee, you don’t need a recipe. If you’re still working toward that, here’s one from the Home Baking Association.

Perfect Buttermilk Biscuits

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

¼ teaspoon baking soda

¼ teaspoon salt

½ cup cold butter

¾ cup cold buttermilk

1 tablespoon melted butter

Preheat oven to 450°.

Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a large bowl. Cut in butter until crumbly.

Stir in buttermilk until just moistened.

Turn dough onto lightly floured surface; knead about 10 times or until smooth. Roll out dough to ¾" thickness, and cut biscuits with a 2½" cutter.

Place biscuits 1" apart on an ungreased baking sheet. Brush tops with melted butter, and bake 10 to 14 minutes or until lightly browned.

Makes 8 biscuits.