Country-fried smothered steak biscuit sandwich
Ingredients:
Buttermilk biscuits- 2.5 cups self rising flour (300 grams)
- 1 stick of frozen butter (grated - 4 ounces/113 grams)
- 1 cup cold buttermilk (224 grams)
- 2 tablespoons melted butter (to be painted on top after baking)
Country-fried steak
- 2 pieces of sandwich sized cube steak, pre-tenderized (around a pound total)
- 3⁄4 cup buttermilk
- 2 teaspoons salt (divided)
- 2 teaspoons ground black pepper (divided)
- 1 cup all purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon paprika
- 1⁄2 teaspoon onion powder
- 1⁄2 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1⁄2 teaspoon cayenne pepper powder
- 1⁄4 teaspoon MSG (optional)
- canola or vegetable oil (for frying - 1/2 inch deep in a pan)
Cream gravy
- 2 tablespoons frying grease (from above)
- 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
- 1 cup whole milk
- 1⁄2 teaspoon salt
- 1⁄2 teaspoon ground black pepper
Directions:
Buttermilk biscuits: preheat oven to 475 F (245 C).
Measure or weigh your flour. Grate frozen butter into the sifted self-rising flour. Stir to combine until the butter is fully coated by flour.
Put the bowl in the freezer for 10 minutes. It's important to keep the butter as cold as possible through this process.
Combine buttermilk with the cold flour/butter to bring it together as a dough. Stir no more than 15 times. Overworking the dough at this stage could cause your finished biscuits to be more tough. Your dough at the end of 15 stirs will be very shaggy and not smooth at all.
On a floured surface, dump out the dough and roll it with a rolling pin. If you don't have a rolling pin, you can just use your hands. Dust with flour as needed when the dough gets sticky. Fold the dough over on itself five different times. This folding process is what creates the layers in the biscuits.
Roll or flatten the dough to 3/4 to 1 inch thick/tall.
Cut biscuits into circles or squares and place on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. If you have a set of biscuit cutters, I prefer the 3-inch diameter cutter for biscuit sandwiches. When cutting, you do not want to twist the cutter. Twisting while cutting will ruin the layers that you created with folding. Place your cut biscuits next to each other (touching) on the sheet pan. Touching biscuits helps each other rise taller.
After cutting biscuits, you can grab any scraps of dough and reroll and re-cut them. There's no need to waste any dough. The last few biscuits might not look as uniform as the first ones, but they will all taste the same.
Bake at 475 degrees F (245 C) for around 15 to 20 minutes. Check around the 12-minute mark to make sure they do not brown too much.
When biscuits are done, transfer them from your baking pan onto a cooling rack to stop the bottoms from cooking further.
Paint the melted butter on top of each biscuit.
Country-fried steak: In a medium bowl or zip-top bag, add the steak, buttermilk, 1 teaspoon of salt, and 1 teaspoon of black pepper. This buttermilk should help to tenderize the steak, so you should let it marinate for at least 4 hours or up to overnight.
When you are ready to get started with the frying process, grab two bowls. To the first bowl, pour in the buttermilk from the marinade and the steaks. To the second bowl, add all-purpose flour, 1 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon black pepper, paprika, onion powder, garlic powder, cayenne powder, and MSG (if using). Stir everything to combine.
Shake off a piece of steak and add it to the bowl with the flour mixture. Coat the steak thoroughly, making sure that the flour fully coats it and there are no wet spots, uncovered by flour. Then, put the steak back in the buttermilk marinade to get it fully wet before coating in seasoned flour for a final time. This double coats the meat, ensuring that the crust will be crunchy.
Move that fully-floured, dredged piece of steak to a plate to rest. Repeat with the other steak.
Add oil 1/2 deep to a large skillet over medium-high heat.
Add a pinch of flour to the oil, and if it immediately starts to bubble, the heat is right. Add steaks and fry them for 3 minutes on the first side. After 3 minutes, flip and fry the second side for 3 minutes or until the batter of the steak is nice and golden brown.
Once the steak is golden brown to your liking, remove it from the oil and place it on a paper towel-lined plate or a cooling rack to rest. DO NOT discard all of the oil yet.
Cream gravy: Reserve 2 tablespoons of the oil you just used to fry the steaks. Discard the rest of the oil and wipe out your pan.
Add the pan back to medium heat and add the two tablespoons of the reserved oil. Add two tablespoons of all-purpose flour and whisk the flour into the oil. Cook for 1 to 2 minutes to cook off the flour flavor.
Slowly add 1 cup of milk to the pan with the flour mixture. Whisk or stir constantly to ensure that you have no lumps in the gravy.
Add salt and pepper and taste for flavor. If the flavor is good, cook the gravy for 3 or 4 minutes or until the gravy starts to thicken.
Sandwich assembly: Slice a biscuit and toast it if it is cold.
Add one country-fried steak piece into the biscuit and cover with 3 or so tablespoons of gravy. Close the biscuit, serve, and enjoy.
Notes:
You can freeze a batch of biscuits prior to baking, and then when you want to make just one or two biscuits, you can bring them out and cook (still frozen) at 475 degrees F for about 15 minutes. You will want to check around the 12-minute mark and keep an eye on them to see if they are browning fast enough.
If you do not have self-rising flour, you can use all-purpose flour, salt, and baking powder at a rate of 1.5 teaspoons baking powder + 1/4 teaspoon salt to each cup of flour. For this recipe, that would be:
- 1 tablespoon + 3/4 teaspoon baking powder (17 to 18 grams)
- a heaping 1/2 teaspoon salt (2 to 3 grams)
- 2.5 cups of all-purpose flour (300 grams)
Mix the flour, baking powder, and salt together before adding butter.