Recipe: Ruth’s Old-Fashioned Biscuits

2 cups self-rising flour
2 tablespoons shortening
¾ cup milk (approximately) any kind of milk—buttermilk is good
More self-rising flour (approximately ¼ cup)
2 teaspoons bacon grease (Ruth has her family on a diet. She substitutes cooking spray.)

Blend the shortening into the flour until it is in pieces about the size of small peas.
Pour the milk into the dry ingredients, and mix the fire out of them. Make the mixture as moist as possible, and still have it in good condition to handle. Form the dough into a ball. Then sprinkle flour onto a cutting board and lift the dough from the mixing bowl to the board. Flour your hands. Knead the dough.

Ruth’s method: shape the dough into biscuits by rolling the in your hands. Place them in a greased pan.

Alternate method: Sprinkle flour thinly over the top and pat out the dough until it is about 1 inch thick. Cut the dough with a biscuit cutter, and place the biscuits in a greased pan.
If a crusty surface is desired, place the biscuits in the pan so that they are about an inch apart; but if thick, soft biscuits are preferred, place them so that the edges touch. Bake 18 to 20 minutes in a hot oven.
6 servings