I will be watching with interest. Somewhere I have a corn bread recipe that uses frozen corn and maybe 1/2 can of creamed corn, but I have to track it down. It definitely had the strong corn flavor, but it was sweet which you said you don't care for, though we really like it a little sweet. I hope someone has the cornbread Holy Grail recipe!

Alexa

I've found nothing better than this one. It's delicious, with or without butter and tastes nothing like a muffin or Jiffy Mix.

Real Cornbread - Ronni Lundy

good cornbread is all about the cornmeal....and "THE" cornmeal is not thes tuff in the round box.
Go and get some real stone ground cornmeal with all the germ still in it....then you will have cornbread.
Linda C

A good friend in Tennessee shared this recipe with me.

3/4 cup (1-1/2 sticks) butter, softened
1/2 cup sugar
4 eggs
1-14 oz. can cream style corn
1/2 cup cheddar cheese
1/2 cup Monterey jack cheese
4 - 6 slices bacon (optional)
1 cup flour
1 cup yellow corn meal
4 tablespoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt

1. Fry bacon, drain and chop. Preheat oven to 350°F. Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs, one at a time, and beat just until light and fluffy. Fold in remaining ingredients.
2. I use four 6" round x 1" deep cast iron pans to bake the cornbread*. Since you probably wonÂt have that size, you can use a well seasoned cast iron skillet or cornbread pan instead. Spray the cast iron with a non-stick cooking spray or rub lightly with bacon grease or vegetable oil, and add batter. Bake at 350°F for 25-30 minutes.
3. You may have to increase the time depending on the size skillet you use. Also good if you stick the skillet under the broiler when cornbread is done baking to lightly brown the top crust (watch very carefully!). Very buttery and moist! Freezes well.

I don't usually use bacon, and I have, on occasion, forgotten to add the sugar, and it still comes out good.

*My round cast iron pans hold about 2 cups of water each. If your cast iron skillet can hold 8 cups of water, the cornbread batter wonÂt run over and make a mess in your oven. I usually halve this recipe and freeze the remaining half of the creamed corn.

My everyday cornbread is similar to the one posted by Jim, except that I use Three Rivers self-rising cornmeal mix and bake the cornbread in a little cast iron skillet that AnnT sent me in a swap.

Three Rivers Cornbread

3/4 cup good quality self-rising cornmeal mix
1 TB or less sugar
1 TB oil
1 egg
3/4 cup buttermilk
2 TB bacon drippings

Heat the bacon drippings in a small skillet until smokin' hot.

Stir the cornmeal mix and sugar together. Add the TB of oil, the egg, and the buttermilk. Stir together quickly until well mixed.

Pour in the hot bacon drippings and mix well. Then pour the batter into the hot pan. Bake at 450 for 15-20 minutes until brown on top and a toothpick comes out clean. Remove cornbread cake from the skillet onto a plate or bread board. Cut into 4 portions. Serve hot with butter.

I grew up in Mississippi, and my grandma made cornbread almost every day. For me, it's a matter of proportion.

Put some bacon drippings or oil in a black cast iron skillet and put it in a 375 degree oven while you mix the batter.

Start, as lindac says, with REAL cornmeal, stone ground, and NOT a mix. I like yellow. Add an equal amount of self rising flour and a little extra salt. Add 1/2-1 T sugar (so it will brown well). Then stir in enough milk to make a batter like thick pancake batter. (You can add an egg if you want to; I don't).

When the oil in the skillet is JUST starting to smoke, pour the batter in the skillet and stick it in the oven. Bake it until the cornbread is nicely browned. How long depends on how big your skillet is.

Let the cornbread sit about 5 minutes after it comes out of the oven. If you cut it too soon, the middle will be gummy--and that's not good.

My cornbread is like Teresa's except I don't use any sugar. It browns just fine and I always bake it in an iron skillet. My cornstick pans are cast iron as well and the same mixture works for them. I love the cornsticks because there's more crust, my favorite part.

jude

I make it like Jimster, except that I use two eggs plus 1-1/4 cups buttermilk. I use no sugar, and if it were up to me, I would use bacon drippings, but DB does not eat pork, and so I have to use butter instead. Occasionally, I add jalapeño to it, but I sauté that before adding it. And as noted above, you must use the best stone ground cornmeal for the best results.

Now I want to buy a cornstick pan!

Lars

I've been using the recipe that Jimster posted. If I don't have bacon drippings, I use lard, and use kefir instead of buttermilk (which I always happen to have in my fridge). Depending on availability and who's here for the meal, I may add diced hot peppers. Although I have a cornstick pan, I prefer a cast iron fry pan.

I just like Jiffy corn muffins. My MIL makes southern corn bread (very bitter and dry) and I always say "it tastes like something a poor person would eat!"

LOL, stirfryi, I like Jiffy corn muffins too, and Jiffy is a Michigan company so they're everywhere here.

Elery is from Tennessee and his sister says it is NOT cornbread unless you use white cornmeal and no sugar. Hers is also kind of dry but since we usually eat it with beans, it's all good.

I like it all, from Ann T's sweet version to my SIL's dry and unsweetened version to Jiffy Mix. My girls like the Jiffy Mix if I add crumbled bacon and a can of chopped green chilies.

I always bake mine in a cast iron skillet. I add the grease to the skillet and stick it in the oven until it's good and hot, then pour in the batter and bake. It gives it such a nice crunchy crust that way.

I do find that cornbread is like bread, kind of. Depending on the humidity and the flour and the cornmeal, a recipe that I use a lot sometimes is too dry and sometimes it's just fine. I've learned to compensate by adding more liquid if my batter doesn't look just right.

Annie

I posted this a while back; regular readers, please forgive the repetition.

You have touched on a topic which people will debate with theological zeal, i.e., should corn bread have sugar and/or flour. The farther removed from the Deep South you are, the more acceptable such 'adulterants' (grin) become.

I will grant a point to those who use sugar and flour: unless the quality of the corn meal is very good, cornbread made with just corn meal can be bitter. Meal can go rancid and stale pretty quickly. But cornbread made with fresh cornmeal, preferably stone-ground locally, is plenty sweet on its own.

I generally only buy small quantities of cornmeal--just enough to make whatever recipe I'm making, and I buy it at a store that seems to have a good turnover of product. (That means not buying it at a gourmet store. No telling how long that stuff has been on the shelf.)

Fortunately in my area of South Carolina there are a few grist mills not too far away that supply the local stores.

Bernard Clayton's 'New Complete Book of Breads' actually has a listing for 2 different breads. One he calls "Yankee Corn Bread" (sugar, flour, yellow corn meal) and the other is Southern Corn Bread (white corn meal, no sugar or flour.)

I find, though, that the freshness of the meal is more important than whether it's white or yellow.

For those with access to good fresh meal I recommend this recipe for Southern Corn Bread, from Clayton (it's pretty similar to Jimster's prior post):

2 eggs, room temp
2 cups buttermilk, room temp
1 tsp baking soda
2 cups white cornmeal (but yellow is okay, too)
1 1/2 tsp salt

Preheat oven and baking utensil (skillet or 9 x 9 pan) to 450 while mixing batter.

In a small bowl beat the eggs and mix in the buttermilk. In a mixer bowl, mix the baking soda, cornmeal and salt. Pour in the egg-buttermilk mixture and mix well until smooth.

Pour batter into the preheated pan, return to oven for 20 to 25 minutes. It's done when a knife inserted into the center of the pan comes out clean & dry.

I use this recipe when I make cornbread dressing for Thanksgiving; a quadruple recipe just barely fits into a 5 quart KitchenAid mixer bowl, and into an 11 x 14 pan. Absolutely delicious.

This is what you use to soak up the pot juices from cooking black-eyed peas or greens. I always called those juices 'pot liquor' but my wife wondered what the heck I was talking about when I used that term. I guess that's southern as well.

If I seem to go on & on, please forgive me: I'm on Atkins and can't have any cornbread right now. When I lose another 20 pounds, though, I'm going on a carbo bender which will most definitely include a batch of this cornbread.

I usually follow the recipe on the package (kinda). I use the whole grain cornmeal and white whole wheat (trying to pretend to be healthy), use less sugar, and throw in a bunch of frozen corn. Chilies of course. Sometimes vanilla. Yeah that's right--vanilla!

For heathens (like me) only:

A copy-cat recipe for Boston Market's corn bread says to mix together a box of Jiffy corn bread and a box of jiffy white cake mix. Follow ingredient directions on each box.
It is really good.
Jo

One thing my grandmother used to do when she took her cornbread out of the oven was to immediately place the skillet on a damp towel and put another one over the skillet. This "steamed" the crust. Thats how I've always made it.

And I agree w/ everyone about having the skillet hot when you pour in the batter.

Regards,

Tom

The best cornbread I ever made (had) was using a recipe from Cook's Illustrated:

All-Purpose Cornbread
Before preparing the baking dish or any of the other ingredients, measure out the frozen kernels and let them stand at room temperature until needed. When corn is in season, fresh cooked kernels can be substituted for the frozen corn. This recipe was developed with Quaker yellow cornmeal; a stone-ground whole-grain cornmeal will work but will yield a drier and less tender cornbread. We prefer a Pyrex glass baking dish because it yields a nice golden-brown crust, but a metal baking dish (nonstick or traditional) will also work. The cornbread is best served warm; leftovers can be wrapped in foil and reheated in a 350-degree oven for 10 to 15 minutes.

Makes One 8-inch Square

1 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour , (7 1/2ounces)
1 cup yellow cornmeal (5 1/2 ounces), see note
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon table salt
1/4 cup packed light brown sugar (1 3/4ounces)
3/4 cup corn kernels (3 1/2 ounces), frozen
1 cup buttermilk
2 large eggs
8 tablespoons unsalted butter (1 stick),melted and cooled slightly

1. Adjust oven rack to middle position; heat oven to 400 degrees. Spray 8-inch-square baking dish with nonstick cooking spray. Whisk flour, cornmeal, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in medium bowl until combined; set aside.

2. In food processor or blender, process brown sugar, thawed corn kernels, and buttermilk until combined, about 5 seconds. Add eggs and process until well combined (corn lumps will remain), about 5 seconds longer.

3. Using rubber spatula, make well in center of dry ingredients; pour wet ingredients into well. Begin folding dry ingredients into wet, giving mixture only a few turns to barely combine; add melted butter and continue folding until dry ingredients are just moistened. Pour batter into prepared baking dish; smooth surface with rubber spatula. Bake until deep golden brown and toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, 25 to 35 minutes. Cool on wire rack 10 minutes; invert cornbread onto wire rack, then turn right side up and continue to cool until warm, about 10 minutes longer. Cut into pieces and serve.

Cooks Illustrated, January 2005

Lori

My cornbread has to have yellow corn meal and no corn kernels. I bake it in a cast iron skillet in the oven. I also add cracklings in it when I find them in the store. I like the basic not to sweet cornbread , hubby likes it sweeter than I do.

I made chili and cornbread last week! The recipe I use is the one on the back of the round Quaker box. I like it a lot... it has just the right amount of sugar for me. Though I've added sugar before and liked it even better. This time, I used 1/4 cup less corn meal and one 1/4 cup more flour to see if the texture would be more cake like. It wasn't, and the flavor suffered in the translation. I don't think there is a such thing is too sweet cornbread, just enjoy in moderation LOL. Sometimes, I overbake it and it gets dry and crumbles. If it cracks on top, I know I'm in trouble.

Since I started taking it out a couple minutes before the MINIMUM bake time and since I switched from silicone to springform pan, it turns out much better (as does anything... silicone is dreadful). I know it would be best made in cast iron, but I don't own such a beast.

Sorry the recipe didn't work well for you... I really like it!

Lorijean's cornbread looks like what we had in school when I was growing up... and it was good.