Southern Sausage Gravy Recipe

Here is an easy recipe for Southern Gravy. Althouth this is Sausage Gravy, you can substitute bacon or leave the meat out if you prefer.



Ingredients
1/2 pound ground breakfast sausage
1/4 cup bacon grease
1/4 cup diced onion
2-4 tablespoons all purpose flour
milk - as described in procedure below
salt and pepper to taste

If you do not have bacon grease on hand, first cook enough bacon to produce 1/4 cup of grease (I didn't say this was a low fat dish).

Directions
1. Brown the sausage, adding the chopped onions the last minute of cooking the sausage. Set the sausage/onion mixture aside.
2. Pour the bacon grease in a large frying pan on medium heat. After the grease begins to bubble, add one tablespoon of flour while stirring constantly. Watch the consistency of the roux and add more flour as necessary to obtain a thick, dull colored paste. There should be no visible grease in the roux. At the same time, it should NOT be dry. The best I can describe the appearance is to say it should be a wet paste. More wet than paste. If it appears too greasy, add flour. If it appears too dry, add bacon grease.

Note 1: You must get the roux consistency correct at this point. You can NOT add flour or grease after this or you will end up with lumpy gravy!
Note 2: If you want white gravy, go to the next step (milk) just as the roux begins to show color. If you want brown gravy (my recommendation) cook the roux until it turns a rich brown color (just before burning). Remember, you must constantly stir the roux.
3. Add one cup milk while stirring. As the roux dissolves and the milk begins to boil, add more milk a little at a time while watching the thickness of the gravy. The thickness of your final gravy is determined at this point. The thickness will be determined by how much milk you add and how long you cook it. Remember, when the gravy is removed from the heat and cools, it will become thicker. Only experience and your own preference will guide you as to how thick a gravy you end up with. I prefer a medium thickness (the gravy will have the thickness of pancake syrup when I remove from the heat).
4. As you approach the thickness you want, add the sausage/onion mix to the gravy and cook the last minute. Add salt and pepper to taste and remove from heat.
Pour the steaming hot gravy over home made biscuits and you have a treat fit for a king!