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| Time to clamp down on these menaces. |
SKEETER'S CORNER, PAST AND PRESENT:
Skeeter Rants: Maryland Beaten Biscuits
Every year around this time, I am asked to help make a piñata. It’s
either one of the grandkids, or a niece or nephew — lately, word had even spread to their little friends. “My
Grandpa Skeeter knows how to make a piñata!” And do I ever.
I learned the trick when I was riding
horseback for the U.S Border Patrol. Herbert Hoover was President, the Depression was on, and I eked out a living inhaling
lungs full of the dust bowl along the Texas-Mexico line.
South of the border, I found refuge from the sandy air at an oasis called ‘Olvidadizo.’ Roughly
translated: ‘forgetful.’ One thing however was certainly not olvidadizo; the Contessa Caliente. Her eyes,
the color of anthracite. Her brown skin, tight on her arms. Her lips trapped the only moisture for miles around and
she was willing to share it with me; her Mounted Inspector. This was a woman who knew how to inflate latex, and so it was
that, at a birthday party for an orphan she took in, I learned the recipe for piñatas.
I bring this up because last week I found myself in the run-in shed mixing up another batch of papier-mâché.
Christopher Wilco from down the road was turning seven, and well, you can piece the rest together. He’s a nice little
fella, that Christopher, so he brought me a prize for helping him. A bag of Eastern Shore tradition — Maryland Beaten
Biscuits.
I feigned delight, but I think even the tender-aged Christopher saw through me. Maryland
Beaten Biscuits, as anyone with a tongue in their head will tell you, are god awful. Some traditions
— oh, like blood-letting to cure the afflicted — are now, as they should be, memories. It is high time to place
the Maryland Beaten Biscuit squarely in the days of yore.
I opened the bag as Christopher beamed, and took a “mmm-mmm
yummy” bite. Half of it, to my disgust, clogged my mouth. The other half fell into the bucket at my feet; the papier-mâché
bucket. Christopher and I leaned over the pail. “It looks like the same slop,” said my young scientific friend.
I clapped him on the back. “My boy, you’re right! Let’s go look ‘em up.”
So
here, then, is what goes into beaten biscuits: flour, water, lard, salt.
Here is the Contessa’s papier-mâché
recipe: Flour, water and sugar.
So what sounds better to you? Sugar or lard?
In fact, perhaps
they are not “beaten biscuits” in the first place! Maybe they’re “beatin’ biscuits.”
Rock-hard projectiles mixed in the kitchen and fired from cannons.
“Here come the Red Coats, Ma!
Whip up some beatin’ biscuits and I’ll get the powder!” Or, “Wait ‘til your Pa gets home. He’s
gonna git a switch an’ some beatin’ biscuits.”
Once back in the shed, Christopher dumped the
rest of the biscuits in the bucket, added some water, then covered a big balloon with the papier-mâché. We made
a burro; the Contessa’s favorite animal. It’s beautiful.
Such a beatin’ that thing is gonna get
at the party.
