Centering dinner around biscuits with jam: a string of recommendations rather than a recipe

This combination of foods seems to satisfy everyone, and it's a quick way to get dinner on the table. Make the biscuits first and while they're in the oven you'll have time to do everything else.

Not as bitter as orange marmalade, not as sweet as berry jam; apricot jam is perfect in my opinion.

• Two or three flavors of jam

  • In my house that always includes Bon Maman apricot fruit spread¹ and one other, usually raspberry or strawberry. This part gets the kids excited and they usually mix them together to make new flavors, which never seems to get old?

• Biscuits

  • This recipe is the one I go back to every time. Making biscuits takes an attempt or two to figure out, but once you “get it”, they’re a fast and easy way to have fresh bread on the table. You grate the butter with your cheese grater, which speeds up the process. I often use buttermilk and swap half of the all-purpose flour for whole wheat pastry flour for extra flavor, but those are both optional.

• Eggs

  • Over easy, scrambled, however you like them.

• Some kind of fruit, vegetable, and/or pickle

  • A mixed green salad with acidic vinaigrette, a pan of roasted root vegetables, or simply some grapes. Use whatever you’ve got - olives are great too.

1. They advertise this as “lower sugar” but that’s not the main reason to buy it…it’s got a stronger flavor of fruit and feels like it could pass as homemade.