We recently took a mini-vacation to Durham, N.C., to visit my brother at Duke University. He started his freshman year in August and has fallen in love with the city over the past three months. During our brief trip, he introduced us to some of his favorite spots on campus, unique shops on Main Street and friends who have become family.

Throughout our four-day tour of Duke and Durham, my brother made sure we were well-fed.  Not only did we eat at some of the hippest places filled with studious college kids, we also had some amazing, traditional southern fare: chopped barbecue, hush puppies, lots of Cheerwine and, my personal favorite, biscuits and gravy.

While everything we sampled in the South was stick-to-your-ribs good, the biscuits and gravy I had on our first morning stuck in my mind the most.This yankee version will hold me over until my next Durham road trip.

Chive Drop Biscuits and Sausage Gravy

Biscuits

½ cup cold unsalted butter, grated with a cheese grater

1 ½  cups flour

2 tablespoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons chopped chives

¾ cup Greek yogurt

2 tablespoons milk

Preheat oven to 400 degrees and line a baking sheet with parchment paper or grease with butter. In a large bowl, whisk together dry ingredients.Toss butter into bowl and, with hands, work together until mixture resembles coarse meal. Fold in Greek yogurt, chives and milk until a loose dough comes together. Use hands to mound ½ cup sized mounds of dough onto the baking sheet. Bake biscuits until golden brown, about 20 minutes.

Sausage

1 lb. pork sausage

¼  cup flour

2 cups milk whole milk

Salt and pepper, to taste

Heat a large skillet over medium heat; cook sausage, breaking into chunks with a spatula until the meat is crumbled and browned all the way through. Add the flour, stirring until dissolved. Whisk in the milk; continue whisking until the gravy is thick. Season with salt and pepper and serve over biscuits.

Drop biscuits are no-nonsense: don’t overmix, work quickly and literally drop mounds of dough onto your baking sheet. As rushed as that sounds, they come out perfectly moist and fluffy. This recipe features Greek yogurt as a substitute for buttermilk, both of which produce a tangy aftertaste. Fresh chives bring an onion-like flavor and beautiful, bright green color to the golden brown biscuits, which serve as the perfect canvas for the salty, meat-laden gravy. This take on the southern dish is the best version of the recipe this side of the Mason-Dixon line.