Bread goes with salad

It's Thanksgiving week and my mom will be hosting. I asked what my contribution should be and she said salad. We both had some kind of funky restaurant style salad in mind (like greens with fruit and nuts) but neither of us are salad experts.

So I bought bagged field greens and baby spinach. I got slivered almonds, sunflower seeds, pears and canned pineapples. I also picked up regular balsamic vinaigrette as well as some kind of raspberry vinaigrette. We shall see how that goes.

Cleaning, cleaning, cleaning my kitchen I found a BJ's circular/magazine and knew there was something I wanted out of it. I tore it out and tossed the rest. It was a soup recipe but also had a recipe for pesto bread sticks.

That's it! In case my salad is a bust, I'll make bread sticks too. They call for bisquick. But I've never used bisquick. I think its time, what with all my new cooking attempts. So I do some googling and find a recipe for cheesy garlic biscuits and decide to try them too.

Pesto sticks:
Water, bisquick.
Pesto ingredients, which I dont need because I have a packet of pesto mix.

Uh oh, no I don't.
Whatever, I'll improvise and mix 3/4 olive oil with garlic powder and italian seasoning. Works for me.

Mix 2 cups bisquick and 1/2 cup cold water. Roll onto greased and bisquick sprinkled cookie sheet to 10" x 8" flatness. Spread part of the "pesto" onto the dough. Cut into 12 strips then cut in half. Twist each and bake on 450 degrees for 12-14 minutes. Dip into remaining oil to eat.

Dry, flakyish, dry. Not very impressive.

Cheesy garlic biscuits:
Stir 2 cups bisquick, 2/3 cups milk and 1/2 cup (or more) of shredded cheddar until dough forms. Drop into 9 lumps on ungreased cookie pan.
Bake on 450 for 8-10 minutes.
Coat with mixture of 2 tbsp melted butter and 1/8 tsp. garlic powder.

I added a little garlic powder to the dough as well as a teensy hint of old bay just to make things interesting. Yum! (Got the idea from the internet. Apparently Red Lobster serves biscuits that people love.)

So for Thanksgiving, biscuits it is! Especially in the case that my salad sucks.

Lesson learned: water plus bisquick = dry and flaky. Milk plus bisquick = soft and moist.