Biscuits and Gravy at Reveille

There's no better way to get a camp moving on a cold morning than the smell of biscuits baking and sausage gravy in the pan. It's hearty, it's cheap, it feeds a crowd, and it sets everyone up for a full day of work in the woods. This is our standard reveille chow.

Dutch-oven biscuits

Biscuits bake beautifully in a Dutch oven — it's the same coals-top-and-bottom trick that makes it a camp oven. You want more heat on the lid than underneath so the tops brown and the bottoms don't scorch; roughly two-thirds of the coals up top, a third below. Cut your biscuits (a canning ring or a cup works as a cutter) and set them in a greased oven so the sides just touch. Preheat, then bake around 12 to 15 minutes, rotating the oven and lid a few times, until the tops are golden.

Peppery sausage gravy

While the biscuits bake, brown a pound of breakfast sausage in a cast-iron skillet over the coals, breaking it up as you go. Once it's cooked, sprinkle a few spoonfuls of flour over the meat and drippings and stir it around for a minute to cook out the raw taste — that's your roux. Then pour in milk a little at a time, stirring constantly, and let it come up to a simmer and thicken. Now the important part: black pepper, and a lot of it. Good sausage gravy should look freckled. Season with salt to taste and thin with a splash more milk if it gets too thick.

Timing the morning

Start your coals first thing so they're ready when you are, get the biscuits in, and build the gravy while they bake so both finish together. Get the coffee going on a corner of the fire at the same time. Split the biscuits open in a bowl or on a plate and smother them in gravy. It's the kind of breakfast that has the whole camp quiet for a few minutes, and then ready to take on the day. Adapt, overcome, and eat well.