on buttons and biscuits

The more my dad cleans out the garage the more sweet stuff I come across. When my grandmother (dad's mom) passed away a while back, it was my dad and his brothers' job to clean out my grandparents' house and get it ready to sell. Well this was no easy task because they had a really big house with a whooole lot of stuff in it.




It was a hard process finding out what was valuable in a sentimental way versus what could be worth money because no one had the room to keep it all. While we have a lot of things displayed around the house, we still have a ton of their stuff in our garage because my dad has been trying to see what he could sell on ebay but he just hasn't had the time needed to deal with it all. My dad always finds little things he thinks I'll like because he'd rather see someone in the family put it to use rather than just throw things out or put them up on ebay (see brass flowers). He knows how I love to make things so one thing I ended up with was this box of vintage buttons.




I spent a whole night going through them because there were just so many. Most of them come from coats from the 50s and 60s. A lot of them are pairs or even have a third or a fourth, but some are totally unique. I already have plans for what to do with some of them. A lot will end up on stuff in my shop for sure. I've been doing a lot of planning for the shop for a while now, from products to branding. Hey I'm a graphic designer after all. Hopefully it'll all come together soon!




Now, on to biscuits. In my opinion, the best biscuits ever are Red Lobster's Cheddar Bay biscuits. I've been looking for a good way to emulate this for a while but haven't quite nailed it yet. Last night my mom asked if I could whip up some biscuits real quick to accompany dinner so I decided to give it another shot.



These were a real crowd pleaser, yet not quite what I was looking for. I kind of rushed to make sure they were done in time so it's still missing something in the cheddar bay department. I think it needs a sort of brushed butter concoction on top but I don't know what to put in it yet. It needs more salt I think. If anyone knows of a good copy cat recipe, please let me know! :)

Anywho, I'm going to post this recipe anyway because they were still delicious and nice and cheddery. So gather up your ingredients and get ready to mix!



Combine all your dry ingredients with butter. Mix until it starts to come together.



Add buttermilk and an egg and mix. I didn't have buttermilk so I squeezed one tbsp of lemon juice into a measuring cup and then filled it to the one cup line with milk. Let it sit for about five minutes. You'll only need about half this mixture though.




Add the cheese next.



Mix until everything is combined.



At this point I just grabbed clumps of dough, shaped them into patties and put them on a greased baking sheet. You could probably get about 8-10 normal sized biscuits out of this. Or you could be like me and make six biscuits the size of your face. I told you I was rushing! I didn't even remember to shoot the dough on the pan until I put them in the oven..



Whoops!

Pair with something warm and noodley and enjoy!




Big. As. Your. Face. I kid you not.



This is my creep picture.

And this is the biscuit recipe.


Cheddar Garlic Biscuits (aka Not Quite Cheddar Bay)

2 1/4 cups flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1 1/2 sticks butter
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 egg
1 1/2 cup shredded cheddar


Preheat oven to 425F. Combine flour, baking powder, salt, and garlic powder with cut up butter. Mix until a dough forms. Mix an egg into measuring cup containing buttermilk with a fork and then combine with dough. Add cheese and mix until evenly distributed. Form even sized dough balls and place on greased baking sheet. Should yield 8-10 normal sized biscuits. Bake for 20 minutes.


Enjoy!