No, not maybe, I totally think I did. I mean, the honey bourbon bacon pretty much says it all. It’s Derby season, which to me really just means, bring on all the southern food with an extra side of chocolate bourbon pecan pie. PLEASE.
It seems that every year about the end of April/early May I get a little annoyed that there are three foodie days back to back. Don’t get me wrong, I love back to back celebrations and all, BUT well, there is just not enough time to make all the recipes. You’ve got the Kentucky Derby May 1st, Cinco de Mayo May 5th and then Mother’s Day May 10th. See, not enough time!! For me, it’s always a toss-up on which flavor to go for, but I will not lie, Mexican pretty much always wins.
Today’s kind of different though since I feel like I am combining a little bit of each. You’ve got the Mexican inspired spicy jalapeño-cheddar spiked biscuits, paired with the sweet Southern flavors of the classic Hot Brown toppings. Kind of awesome, right? I promise it is.
The biscuits are actually adapted from ones that I made a few years back. To this day, they are still one of my favorite breads to make for BBQ’s and such. They are buttery, sweet, spicy and cheesy with just the right amount of crumble. It’s kind of like when you find the perfect cookie recipe, but with biscuits. And I know from experience that you do not mess with a good thing, so I kept the biscuits pretty much the same. Really though, the biscuits are what make these Kentucky Hot Brown sandwiches. Well, the biscuits and the bourbon bacon, but maybe that’s kind of obvious. I am not normally all that into bacon, but when you make it sweet, spicy and extra crispy… plus a little boozy, I am so game. Besides, the bourbon and the honey just felt so southern and Kentucky-ish, I just had to go for it.
The rest is your basic, but delicious Hot Brown. I just used turkey from the deli, which I am not sure is really an “acceptable” thing to do, but I did, and I quite in enjoyed it too. That’s probably mostly due the fact that I pretty much smothered my turkey in mornay sauce. Yeah.
Also, instead of warming my tomatoes in the oven, I placed them fresh right on to my biscuits, since I am not the biggest fan of warm tomatoes. For me, they either have to be roasted to a crisp or just eaten fresh. Since the heirlooms are oh so pretty, I went with fresh. SOO GOOD I tell ya. Oh, and I do feel that I should mention that those drinks are not really what they seem to be. It was like ten in the morning the day I made these and well, liquor just didn’t seem appropriate at that hour…
But once you hit noon, all bets are off and you should probably just make Julep. <– Take that Wednesday.
