Scallion Biscuits with Sausage Gravy

Time for the Gluten-Free Ratio Rally! Gretchen of Kumquat hostessed this month with the challenge of biscuits. What a great way to start off the new year. Growing up in South Florida, biscuits with sausage gravy comes to my mind first. It's been eons since I've had biscuits and gravy; probably a good ten years. I decided to throw some scallions in there, since I've been craving Chinese style scallion pancakes for some time and since it's nice to get some green in my food during the winter. These definitely hit the spot. Oof. Should hold me over for some time.

The Gluten-Free Ratio Rally is a group of GF bloggers, rallied by Shauna of GlutenFreeGirl.com, where we put our on spin a a culinary standard. These culinary standards are known formulas, ratios, that professionals use. The caveat is that everything is done by weight, since weight is more standardized and much more accurate than measuring by volume. This is the foundation of the GFreeRally as started and explained by Gluten-Free Girl here. The book that we base our ratios is Michael Ruhlman's Ratio. Ruhlman's biscuit ratio is a 3 parts flour : 2 parts liquid : 1 part butter recipe. Mine turned out to be to the same 3:2:1/flour:milk:butter. There are some major tricks here. First, boil the milk and add it to half the flour to gelatinize the sweet rice flour to give it some elasticity. Second, cool down the dough before adding in the butter. This ensures the butter will not completely mix in, giving some rise and flakiness to the biscuits. Third, roll out the dough and fold multiple times to give many layers to the biscuits. Lastly, and most importantly handle the dough as little as possible. The colder the keep the dough, the better rise and less the butter will melt. The sausage gravy is a traditional bechamel thickened with a roux made with potato starch.

Ingredients:

Biscuits:

200 grams (mL) milk, boiling
150 grams sweet rice flour
150 grams brown rice flour
1 teaspoon (6 g) kosher/sea salt
1 tablespoon (14 g) baking powder
100 grams unsalted butter, cold, cut into 1/4" cubes
3-4 scallions, greens only (reserve white ends for gravy), chopped finely

Sausage Gravy:

60 grams potato starch
60 grams butter
1 teaspoon salt
dash nutmeg
black pepper
300 grams (mL) milk
1 pound your favorite breakfast (sage) sausage
3-4 white ends of scallions, finely chopped


Directions:

Biscuits:

Preheat oven to 400F. Place the sweet rice flour in the work bowl of the stand mixer fitted with a paddle mixer. Add in the salt. With the mixer on low, add in the bowling milk in one portion. Allow to mix until it is cool enough to touch. Add in the brown rice flour and baking powder. Put the bowl in fridge until it has cooled down. Return to mixer on low and add in the cubed butter, followed by the chopped scallions.

Turn out the dough onto a lightly floured cool surface. Roll out with minimal handling into a rectangle. Fold into thirds. Roll out again and repeat. Chilling may be necessary in between depending if it gets too warm/soft. Repeat this about 4 times. Last time, roll out evenly with even edges with a dough thickness of about 3/4". Cut into about 12 squares using a large, sharp chef knife. Space out evenly onto a sheet of parchment paper. Brush with milk or egg wash. Bake for about 20 minutes until golden brown. Cool on a rack.

Sausage Gravy:

In a medium/large fry pan over medium heat, brown the sausage. Breaking up into small pieces. Turning frequently. Once browned, remove from heat, strain fat/liquid. Add in chopped white ends of scallions. This will be added to the bechamel sauce.

Meanwhile, in a medium sauce pan, heat the potato starch and butter over medium heat. Add in the salt, pepper, and nutmeg. Stir continuously with a whisk. After a couple of minutes, turn the heat to low and add in the milk (that's been heated in the microwave) with whisking. Turn up the heat to medium and whisk continuously until the sauce has thickened and starts to boil. If it is too thick, add tiny increments of additional milk until desired thickness is achieved. Add in the sausage and scallions. Taste for seasoning and add more if needed. Enjoy!

-Erin Swing
The Sensitive Epicure

Head on over to Gretchen's host post to see her amazing Sweet Buttermilk Biscuits and all the other fantastic recipes brought to you by rally participants this month! Thanks again Gretchen for hosting a biscuit of a challenge! Also, if you're on Twitter, search #GFreeRally

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