Welcome to the second installment of Cliff Notes, authored by my favorite baker and my favorite Cliff – MY DAD! Dad is the inspiration behind the classics here on the blog. You know him and love him for his Chocolate Chip Cookies, his Buttermilk Pancakes, and he’s also baker of Buttermilk Biscuits that disappear so fast at the dinner table, it’ll make your head spin. Let’s here how these perfect little biscuits came to be from the man, the myth, the legend himself – Clifford Wilson. xo Joy
Confident Chef and Her Irresistibles
A Biscuit Yarn
My mother was a fabulous cook. But she never measured anything. In fact, we had no measuring cups or spoons, nor did we have a mixer. Mother didn’t even own a cookbook, and there were no recipes she had written down. Our first cookbook was Betty Crocker’s Picture Cook Book that my sister, Dede, had purchased. But by then, Mother had long been braising cube steak that fell apart before it hit the plate, and her slow-roasted leg of lamb could be eaten with no teeth. Indeed, Mother had been knowing her way around the kitchen nigh on 30 years! From her luxurious gravies and sauces to her irresistible cakes and pies, she had them down!
Since early age in Tennessee and Arkansas, cooking for her father, her sickly mother and sisters, my mother used her eyes, hands, and taste to learn the behavior of ingredients when they’re brought together. She developed a preciseness in textures; how dough felt to the touch, how batter dripped off a spoon, and how all types of food responded to heat. Her absolute favorite ingredient was butter. In her opinion, butter made everything taste better. But she knew when to use it and when not to, especially during the Great Depression and World War II when butter was rationed and other forms of fat were cheaper.
Procter & Gamble had an effective marketing campaign for its easy-to-use and versatile Crisco vegetable shortening. Millions of bakers made their cakes, cookies, and pie crusts with this inexpensive product, even to this day. And shortening is a basic storeroom item in foodservice for deep-frying as well as for frying foods at home. Besides using Crisco, my mother used bacon grease left over from breakfast. Growing up, one of my favorite meals was fried chicken and biscuits, which we had for supper on Sunday afternoons after church. Mother would scoop shortening and congealed bacon grease into a cast iron skillet and heat it up. Then she’d take chicken pieces that had been soaking in an egg and buttermilk bath overnight in the fridge, and would double-dip them in salted, paprika-laced flour before putting them in the hot oil. She’d cut shortening and bacon grease into flour for her biscuits, too! When it was time to eat, I’d pull apart a hot fluffy biscuit, slather on some butter and load it up with fig jam made from the figs off the tree in our backyard. Although I had just gotten out of church, chowing down 3 or 4 of those mouth-watering biscuits had convinced me that I had died and gone to heaven.
When Mother was elderly, she continued to cook southern-style, with the same Great Depression thriftiness; she continued to use shortening and bacon grease in spite of alternative dietary trends. And when it came to her special sauces and desserts, BUTTER, the culinary love of her life, always took center stage. When I started making biscuits, I could never duplicate hers, because I never developed her “feel” for the ingredients; I always have to measure everything. I created this biscuit recipe, made with all butter, in honor of my mother’s passion for butter. These flaky bad boys sit tall, and are fantastic for breakfast, lunch and dinner! They make great shortbread for dessert. Or add savory sweet fillings to the shaggy dough—cheddar, dried figs, dark chocolate chunks, anything that pleases. And how about this? When you’re making cornbread stuffing for Thanksgiving dinner, crumble up these biscuits (instead of using bread crumbs) to mix with the crumbled cornbread. Wow! It takes stuffing to a whole new level!
BTW: It won’t hurt my feelings if you sneak in a little bacon grease.
Enjoy!
xo Cliff
Find Dad’s Buttermilk Biscuit recipe here!
And find the first installment of Cliff Notes, on Sweet Potato Pie here!
28 Responses
I am loving these Cliff Notes!
How lovely for you Joy, that you get this history lesson from your Dad. Certainly something to be cherished.
I absolutely LOVE ‘Cliff Notes’! Thank you and look forward to many more!
Cliff Wilson, I love your recipes, I love your stories, but most of all I love your daughter and the unique social media space she has created for others to find a little respite in hard times. Life is a little easier for me because of Joy. Well done, sir. And well done, Joy!
I adore Cliff Notes! This one reminded me so much of my Grandma Mac (a Great Depression survivor, former Army cook, and all around sass master) who could honestly make anything. Her fried chicken was also an ethereal experience and I remember my Grandpa Mac putting on a very superior air and telling me that the secret to fried chicken was using lard and my Grandma Mac leaned over to me and told me she was using Crisco. Keep up the great work, Cliff! You’re the hero we need!
Joy! I adore you and adore Cliff – I have no stories like this in my family so THANK YOU for sharing yours with us. Happiest Thanksgiving to you and Cliff and all of your family!
Thanks for sharing your dad with us. His words resonate and you can literally see the boy in him enjoying the biscuits after church services. He is a delight to “listen” to.
Joy, you look the happiest in this photo with your dad!
I love spending time with my dad and my whole family! It was particularly nice to have my parents visit Will’s in Houston!
I dream of being able to cook and bake like your Mother! I grew up in a “hamburger helper household”, where things were rarely made from scratch, so I basically taught myself how to cook (thanks to help from the many food blogs I’ve read for years – Joy, SmittenKitchen, Not Without Salt, Shutterbean, and Budget Bytes being the regular favorites) in my mid twenties. I feel super confident in the kitchen these days, but I’m definitely a recipes gal.
To be honest, I’m a recipe gal too! And don’t be fooled, we were also a Hamburger Helper Household. And the way I still crave boxed Hamburger Helper is just silly!
Get this man a book deal and TV series! Cliff you are such a talented writer (as is your daughter) and you really bring the past to life with your words. Thank you for sharing your memories and the meaning behind your recipes with us.
Dad is the best!
I agree with all the other comments here. These “Cliff Notes” posts are the best thing on the internet. Don’t we all need a cozy dad to make us special, delicious food while telling us all about Grammy. I cannot adequately express how much I adore these posts. And while your dad makes and shares his delicious food, he can also write a lovely story that just takes you there. How many of us will try our best to learn about food the same way as your Grandmother?!? Thank you!
Very much enjoy the Cliff Notes. Really adds a special touch to the blog.Love reading these… great recipes too.
Thank you so much, Joyce!
These Cliff Notes are the sweetest part of the internet right now. Thank you for sharing your delightful dad with us, Joy!
I feel this, bigtime!
When is Cliff’s autobiography with recipes coming out? ?? We need this!
We’re going to work on this!
Love reading you. Cliff!
I love Cliff! More of this! So enjoying his stories and writing. Having grown up in the South I can taste these biscuits. Sadly, a curse must have been put upon our family because we simply cannot make a decent biscuit. We affectionately call the results of our attempts “hockey pucks.”
Hahahha a curse upon your family!? I feel like we can lift this one!
I lost my sweet Daddy almost six years ago. These writings of your Dad make me miss mine so much more. My Daddy loved to bake. It was something we did together when I’d come home.
This “Cliff Notes” series is my favorite. Thank you so much for sharing.
One if my new favorite installments at Joy the baker’s blog <3
Thanks for sharing your stories, recipes and wisdom with us Me Wilson!
This has been such a nice reading! So inspiring! Thank you so much for sharing. Greetings from Greece.
I love Cliff Notes! Can’t wait to make these!
I loved reading about your memories of your mom’s cooking and this made me hungry for biscuits! Thanks so much for writing!