Hungry Hippo

While in hibernation and hiding from the frosty weather outside, I re-watched Coal-Miner's Daughter, the classic film about the life of Loretta Lynn. As I watched 13 year-old Sissy Spacek-as-Loretta marrying much older Tommy Lee Jones-as-Doo Lynn, I thought about the many things I liked about the South and living in Texas (considered by natives to be two separate and distinct regions, may I add). I only lived in Houston for two years, while I completed my junior and senior year of high school, but my family stayed in Houston for a total of eight years, so I continued to spend holidays in Texas while attending university in Montreal.

Throughout those years, while in Houston, I often hung out in Montrose with my high school friends. Most of the time we aimlessly cruised around town and would end up seeing a movie or playing pool, but sometimes we would catch a band at either the Abyss, Numbers, Fitzgerald's, or Rudyard's. Once in a while, we would find ourselves at a honky-tonk bar down town or rubbing shoulders with bikers at the local ice-house. At the end of those late nights, we'd find ourselves hankering for some late night grease and, inevitably, we'd find ourselves driving to the outskirts of the nearest ghetto to go to a "late-nite" Popeye's drive-thru. Back then, we'd order the combo meal, which was a small cup of rice and beans, two pieces of fried chicken--always spicy--and a fluffy biscuit, to split between two people. Most of the time, we couldn't wait to drive to someone's house to eat--we just parked somewhere and ate in the car. I found Popeye's to have some of the tastiest fast food that I've had, and although I really like the chicken and even the rice and red beans, my heart was always in the biscuit. Such light, fluffy biscuits, obviously made using some sort of vegetable shortening that served to swiftly deliver salty, flourly deliciousness straight to my tastebuds.

As I watched the newly married Sissy/Loretta attempting to learn how to cook, I thought about making my own biscuits. Since I'm not from the South, I didn't have a special "Grandmama's recipe" to recreate, but I did want to try to recreate the taste of Mr. Popeye's biscuits. The main difference in my attempts was the use of good ingredients, such as real, organic butter, instead of shortening that doubles as mechanic-grease. I ended up tweaking a recipe I found on the inside of a Horizon butter box. I figured that Horizon would want the best biscuit recipe possible to showcase their butter's rich and creamy flavour, so I chose to believe their implicit corporate message. Also, the recipe was for cheese biscuits--and who doesn't love cheese?

• 2 C all purpose unbleached flour
• 4 t baking powder
• 1/2 t salt
• 1/2 C salted butter (1 stick)
• 1 1/2 C shredded white cheddar
• 1/2 to 3/4 C whole milk

Preheat oven to 400 F. Measure and pour all dry ingredients into a food processor. Cut up cold butter and also add to the food processor bowl. Run the food processor with a regular blade to cut butter into the dry ingredients. The mixture should now resemble cornmeal. Empty the contents of the food processor into a mixing bowl. Mix in shredded cheese. Then, add milk slowly and blend until dough becomes sticky. Drop spoonfuls of dough onto a parchment paper-lined cookie sheet. Bake for approximately 20 minutes until golden. Cool on rack. Makes about 15 biscuits.

Straight out of the oven, these biscuits are amazingly like Popeye's biscuits, but cheesy! Loretta would have made Doo happy with these bad boys. For overnight storage, make sure to NOT use an airtight container. I've found that wrapping up completely cooled biscuits with parchment paper works best. But, honestly, the best way is to just eat them while they are still warm.