665130 Fri Nov 06 05:57:37 -0800 2009 9 31 Home Cooking 0 5160402 I was going to wait until New Year's Day to have a full Hoppin' John blowout / Twilight Zone marathon, but now that I have black eyed peas and collards on the brain, I don't think I can wait that long! I need a cornbread recipe that my North Carolina friends would approve of--not too sweet, no whole corn kernels--and that I can bake in my 10" cast iron. Any suggestions? Fri Nov 06 05:57:37 -0800 2009 130788 yannie 1 5160524 Great timing. I just posted about this on my blog. I am just copying it from there: This is just a recipe for cornbread. Boring right? However, every time I need to make cornbread I have to track down THIS recipe. This usually involves calling my sister and getting her to give it to me again. I promised her the last time, that I would make a more permanent note of it. So here it is. The ingredients are all very normal and standard. Somehow though, these exact proportions create a way better cornbread then all the other recipes. The small amount of sugar in the recipe is more for seasoning like salt, not for sweetness. Cornbread 1 cup corn meal 1 cup all-purpose flour 1 tablespoon baking powder 1 teaspoon salt 2 teaspoons sugar 1/4 cup vegetable oil 1 1/8 cup buttermilk 1 egg Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Mix together corn meal, flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar in a medium bowl. Whisk together buttermilk and egg in a large measuring cup. Pour the oil in a cast iron baking pan, place it in the hot oven. Add the liquid ingredients into the dry ingredients. Combine gently. Pour half of the hot oil from the pan into the batter. Stir in well. Pour the batter into the baking pan and place in the oven. Bake about 15 minutes or until the top and edges are browning in spots. Loosen from the pan, and turn out onto a rack to cool. Fri Nov 06 06:54:17 -0800 2009 5160402 11259 Becca Porter 2 5161222 I'm sure this is a fine cornbread, but the OP was asking for a traditional southern cornbread, and that's not what this is. First off, a 1:1 cornmeal-flour ratio is all wrong. One and a half cups corn meal to one-half cup flour would be closer to the mark, though I've seen southern cornbreads that use even less flour, and some that use no flour at all. Also, vegetable oil brings no flavor: melted butter or bacon fat would be a more traditional fat. The main key to a quality southern cornbread is to use as coarse a cornmeal as you can find: avoid Quaker corn meal, especially. It's close to the consistency of cake flour, and your cornbread will have no body. Goya coarse-ground is my favorite, but if you can't find it, anything stoneground will do. Fri Nov 06 10:37:23 -0800 2009 5160524 17548 BarmyFotheringayPhipps 3 5161595 Your probably right. After all, it looks like you are from Boston and I am just from Louisiana... I am pretty sure she wanted a good southern cornbread, not just the most authentic. Down here, as long as it is not sweet, and is baked in a cast iron skillet it is considered southern. and as often as I make cornbread, I can't use bacon fat every time. Though it is great every now and then. I am actually making cracklin cornbread tonight. Fri Nov 06 12:29:40 -0800 2009 5161222 11259 Becca Porter 4 5161639 I'm from Texas, punkin, and my mama taught me how to make skillet cornbread when I was about six years old. My credentials are in order. She asked for a traditional southern cornbread recipe. Few if any traditional southern cornbread recipes use a 1:1 ratio, and they sure as heck don't use vegetable oil. Fri Nov 06 12:44:10 -0800 2009 5161595 17548 BarmyFotheringayPhipps 1 5161051 I've heard good things about the Skillet Cornbread on Southern Plate: http://www.southernplate.com/2008/10/dixie-cornbread-go-dawgs.html Fri Nov 06 09:44:48 -0800 2009 5160402 150094 ChristinaMason 1 5161572 Paraphrased Cook's Illustrated recipe: SOUTHERN-STYLE CORNBREAD Makes one 8-inch skillet of bread. Published in Cook's Illustrated May 1, 1998. INGREDIENTS 4 teaspoons bacon drippings or 1 tablespoon melted butter and 1 teaspoon vegetable oil 1 cup yellow cornmeal, preferably stone ground (divided use 1/3 cup & 2/3 cup) 2 teaspoons granulated sugar 1/2 teaspoon table salt 1 teaspoon baking powder 1/4 teaspoon baking soda 1/3 cup water (rapidly boiling) 3/4 cup buttermilk 1 large egg , beaten lightly INSTRUCTIONS Place an oven rack on lower middle shelf of oven. Now place an 8-inch cast-iron skillet, greased with 4 tsp bacon fat or 1 tsp vegetable oil and 1 Tbs melted butter on that rack. Start oven pre-heating to 450-F. In a medium bowl, measure out 1/3 cup of the cornmeal. In another smaller bowl mix the remaining 2/3 cup cornmeal, sugar, salt, baking power and baking soda and set aside until needed. Pour 1/3 cup of boiling water into the 1/3 cup of cornmeal and stir to form a stiff batter. Slowly whisk in buttermilk until batter is smooth, then whisk in the beaten egg. When the oven has reached 450-F and skillet is hot, stir the small bowl of dry ingredients into the larger bowl of moistened cornmeal batter. Remove hot skillet from oven. Pour heated bacon fat or butter from hot skillet into the bowl of batter and stir until mixed. Now quickly pour the bowl of batter into the hot skillet. Return skillet with batter to hot oven. Bake until cornbread is golden brown, about 20-minutes. Remove from oven and turn out cornbread onto wire rack. Cool 5 minutes then serve. Fri Nov 06 12:22:57 -0800 2009 5160402 126101 Antilope 1 5162161 My mother actually uses the Martha White corn meal mix, but this is basically the same thing. Also, their website (www.marthawhite.com) has a product locator. 1 1/2 cup cornmeal (I've always used white) 1/2 cup all-purpose flour 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 teaspoon salt 1 egg, beaten 1 1/3 cups buttermilk 4 tablespoons butter (I always use salted; I think cornbread should taste like salt and butter) Preheat the oven to 450. Combine the dry ingredients, then whisk in the wet (except the butter) until a thick batter forms. Put the butter in your cast iron skillet and put that in the oven until the butter is melted and the skillet is good and hot. Pour the batter over the melted butter and bake for 20-25 minutes, until the top is golden brown. Now, this is how my mother and grandmother always did it: Let cool for a few minutes and then invert the cornbread onto a plate. Slice the top (formerly the bottom) off - about a half inch thickness. Dot the exposed top with pats of butter, then put the cornbread top back on. Slice. Eat. Enjoy. Fri Nov 06 15:25:56 -0800 2009 5160402 1113189 CarolinaGirl06 1 5162714 Use a recipe that calls for making a mush with boiling water. Use stone ground meal, not the really fine stuff. Don't use much if any sugar, and always heat the fat in the pan in a hot oven before pouring in the batter. The CI recipe Antilope posted is a good one. You can make it even leaner without the baking powder and sugar, but the CI recipe covers many people's tastes without veering off track. Bill Neal has a recipe for company corn bread made without a mush, if you want something a little richer and to my taste, not so traditional. Many North Carolinians would know his name, if you care to give him credit: 1 1/2 c. cornmeal 1/2 c. all purpose flour 2 tsp. baking powder 1 tsp. soda 1 tsp. salt 1 Tbsp. sugar 2 large eggs 1 1/2 c. buttermilk 3 Tbsp. butter This will be thinner in a ten inch skillet, and will cook more quickly than in a 9 inch, but both will work. Place skillet on medium low heat or in oven to heat. Whisk dry ingredients in a bowl. In a separate bowl, beat eggs with buttermilk. Melt the butter in the preheated skillet and tilt to coat, then pour the excess into the liquids and whisk again. (This will work better if your liquids are at room temperature, but if they're cold and the butter hardens, don't fret.) Pour the liquids into the dry and mix quickly before pouring into the hot pan. Bake in a 425 degree oven for 23-30 minutes, depending on the size of your skillet. Fri Nov 06 21:40:50 -0800 2009 5160402 24126 amyzan