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Homemade Biscuits

MAKES I DOZEN BISCUITS

3 cups all-purpose flour

5 teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

½ cup Crisco shortening

1 cup milk

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Sift flour, baking powder, and salt together. Cut in shortening until mixture resembles coarse cornmeal. Add milk, using more if needed, to make a soft dough.

Roll out dough on floured board to ¾ inch thickness. Cut into 2-inch rounds. (If biscuit cutter is not at hand, use water glass dipped in flour.) Bake on well-greased cookie sheet for 25 minutes (longer if you want them browner).

Sausage

SERVES 6

2 pounds raw pork

¼ pound pork fat

2 teaspoons salt

1 teaspoon sage

1 teaspoon red pepper flakes

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Grind pork with pork fat. Mix salt, sage, red pepper flakes, pepper, and ground meat. Using 2 heaping tablespoons of meat each, roll into balls, then flatten. Fry in medium-hot skillet until no blood is visible.

JESSICA MITFORD, WHO WAS CALLED DECCA, was a Briton transplanted among the hoi polloi in Oakland, California. To be more precise, Decca Mitford was an English aristocrat who once chose to become a card-carrying member of the Communist Party and live in a working-class town in northern California.

She and her lawyer husband, Robert Treuhaft, later left the party because they concluded that the organization was reneging on some of the high and lofty political and ethical ideals that had first appealed to them.

Bob and Decca lived in a commodious, rambling 1920s California bungalow, where they entertained celebrities and others, from the legendary blues singer Leadbelly to the odd felon on the run.

Bob was always the cook, specializing in the very best Boston baked beans, duck pâté, and butterflied roast leg of lamb. Decca mostly tidied up.

Decca and Bob’s group was planning a large gala, and as preparatory chores were appointed most people thought Decca couldn’t be much help in the kitchen, so she was asked to order the chickens, which more experienced members would then cook.

Decca telephoned the number she had been given for the chickens. “I’d like to order fifty frying chickens to be delivered to a social hall on Wednesday at ten o’clock A.M.”

“Do you want them dressed or undressed?” She said, “Undressed of course.”

Decca told me, “You must know that banqueting is also a part of the struggle.” She went to the meeting hall on Wednesday and was utterly shocked to see fifty chickens delivered with feathers, heads, necks, and feet attached.

She shouted at the deliverymen, “Why do they have all these things on them? I told you I wanted them undressed.”

She was informed that in poultry parlance undressed meant with all the things on them and in them.

Decca called headquarters and told her story. She asked if there were any communists who knew how to dress a chicken.

Within an hour, chicken pluckers and cleaners were at the hall. They immediately began defeathering and disemboweling the chickens. When Decca saw the amount of work that was necessary, she was stricken with gratitude. No one had ever seen her so apologetic.

“Listen, I’m very sorry. And all of this brought about by my saying undressed rather than dressed.”

One of the pluckers said, “You couldn’t have known, Decca. You speak English. We speak American. We also speak poultry. What you do, you do so well. You deserve to take one of these chickens home fully dressed.”

She accepted the chicken. She brought it home and opened a bottle of white wine, and quickly drank one half. Without benefit of recipe, she began to cook. She put the chicken into a casserole pot along with celery, onions, seasoning, and the rest of the wine.

She called her husband and told him what she had done, and she went to bed. When Bob came home, he removed the pot and opened it. The chicken was beautifully cooked.

From that time, I have cooked that dish following Decca’s recipe and served it once a month, both to my delight and to the pleasure of my guests. It is still called Decca’s Chicken, Drunkard Style.

Decca