Advent Biscuits

GrandMary, daddy’s mama, made the best biscuits. If she didn’t make biscuits, there would be no bread at mealtime because this was not the era of store bought bread. Everyday, three times a day, she would stand in her kitchen, measure out the ingredients by eye into her old cracked pottery bowl, and stir up the dough. She turned it out on to a floured dish towel that had been made from a feed sack. After kneading the dough a few times, she took her hand carved rolling pin and rolled it out into a smooth oval. A small glass served as a biscuit cutter. These were her Sunday biscuits. Everyday biscuits were pinched off from the dough before it was rolled out, formed into a small ball and placed in the old smooth black frying pan that was reserved for baking biscuits. Each ball, patted slightly to make a flattened circle, was brushed with milk before baking.
Always... always they were light and rich, ready for cane syrup and butter, or as an afternoon snack, a cold biscuit with a hole punched in it and filled with sugar. Mama and I watched, memorized each step, did the same things she did and never had our biscuits turn out as good as hers. She had a hand for biscuits that came from years of practice. Mama has her frying pan now and I have her rolling pin. Every now and then I make biscuits and remember GrandMary as I turn my dough out on to a floured towel.
Last Sunday morning as I stood in my kitchen making biscuits for our farm church family, I got to thinking about Advent and biscuit making. It seems to me after forty or so years of celebrating Advent, that practice is required to produce a rich, light, tasty Advent, one that satisfies the hunger in our souls. The ingredients are the same every year... hope, love, joy, peace, candles, Bible readings, the journey to Bethlehem... but some Advents are better than others, just like GrandMary’s biscuits. It is the practice, the repetition, the memorizing by the heart that gives us a hand for Advent.
Like GrandMary in the kitchen and monks at prayer, when we do what we love, a miracle happens. Sometimes it is a miracle that we don’t see or feel until later. Sometimes the miracle makes you shine like one of GrandMary’s biscuits fresh from the oven. Or perhaps the miracle is in the practice itself, caring enough to continue to pray and celebrate Advent even when you are not sure of the answers or the outcome. I hope, really hope, I can have a GrandMary biscuit Advent, a melt in my mouth covered in butter and cane syrup tasting of God With Us. I hope you do, too.

Brother Boniface’s Biscuits
The closest recipe I could find for GrandMary’s biscuits came from Brother Boniface, a baker at Mepkin Abbey in South Carolina. He came to the monastic community as a barber but as he says, he got stuck in the pots and pans. His secret? “You’ve godt to have gute recipes.”

2 c. all-purpose flour 1 tbsp. Baking powder ½ tsp. Salt 1/3 c. unsalted butter (Grandmary used lard) A little less than one cup milk

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Sift flour, baking powder and salt together. Using your hands, work in the butter until the mixture is crumbly. Add enough milk to make a dough. Add more milk to make a sticky dough for drop biscuits, less milk to make dough that can be rolled out. Place on a lightly greased pan. Sides touching for soft sided biscuits or separate for crispy sides. Bake at 400 degrees for 10 to 12 minutes. Yield: ten to twelve biscuits.