St. Patrick's Day Biscuits

We take St. Patrick's Day pretty seriously around here. In the old days, that meant a lot of loud Irish punk and some serious pub carousing. Now we settle for excessive amounts of green clothing, nothing but traditional Irish music on the iPod, and cold beverages in a can poured perfectly into pint glasses (see here) enjoyed from the comfort of our own couch. For the last few years, we've attended our church's St. Patrick's Day program, and this year we somehow landed ourselves on the planning committee. It was a blast - Irish stepdancing, snake hunts, cake walks, an appearance by St. Patrick. With all that on the agenda, we managed to talk my parents into coming down for the day...and they brought along my aunt, my eleven-year-old niece, and my eight-year-old nephew. My boys were completely surprised, and the day was subsequently even more fun than anticipated. There is nothing quite as exciting as a group of surprise visitors at the door, especially when the group includes cousins.

We started the day with St. Patrick's Day brunch. This recipe was soooo yummy, and really easy to throw together. I made the biscuits the night before so all I had to do when everyone arrived was warm the biscuits, fry up some eggs, and stack it all together. Yum. As written, the recipe makes 8 to 10 biscuits, but because you only use half a biscuit for each serving, you end up with a lot of extra biscuits. If you are serving a bigger crowd, just make more eggs. The ham is totally optional; use it if you like it, skip it if you don't. I opted to double the recipe and freeze lots of leftover biscuits; we had them for dinner tonight with baked potato soup and enjoyed them all over again.

In addition to tasting good, the biscuits are really pretty to look at. I did not manage to take a decent picture, but the one on the Betty Crocker website gives you a good idea.

It wouldn't be a holiday without a little custom applique...

Happy March!

St. Patrick's Day Biscuits
Adapted from Betty Crocker

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Makes 8-10 biscuits / 8 servings + leftover biscuits

1 package frozen creamed spinach, thawed
2 3/4 cups Bisquick mix
3/4 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
1/4 tsp. ground mustard
2 Tbsp. butter
8 eggs
2 Tbsp. butter, softened
1/4 lb. sliced deli ham (optional)

1. Heat oven to 425 degrees.

2. In medium bowl, mix spinach, Bisquick, cheese, and ground mustard just until dry ingredients are moistened. It seems like you need to add liquid, but you really don't - there is enough in the spinach.

3. On a lightly floured work surface, knead dough eight to ten times. Pat to 3/4 inch thickness; cut with 3 inch round cutter. You should get 8-10 biscuits.

4. Place rounds one inch apart on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 13 to 16 minutes or until golden brown (can be done in advance).

5. In a nonstick skillet, fry eggs to desired consistency in butter. Season with salt and pepper.

6. Split 4 biscuits and spread cut sides with softened butter. Reserve extra biscuits for a later use.

7. Top each biscuit half with a slice of ham and one fried egg.