Although both visions are wonderful, I’m kind of stuck on the cold evenings right now, mainly because it’s all of a sudden freezing here.
We went from a warm and sunny Christmas holiday to a rainy and cold couple of days right before New Years. What a change! I was going to wait and post this at the beginning of the year since BigBearsWife.com is going to be taking more of a southern turn in the new year but I know that a lot of people have cornbread with their traditional southern new years meal so I thought that I should go ahead and post it.
The rain is pouring and the wind is making it a little chilly in the evenings so to warm us up I started to work on some cornbread the other day. Big Bear was making homemade chili and I had plans for slow cooker beef stew the next day so I figured that it was about time for southern cornbread to make an appearance in the kitchen….and by cornbread I meant the real stuff, from scratch. Not the boxed cornbread mix.
Now there isn’t anything wrong with the boxed cornbread mix. Heck, we used it for YEARS.
However, now that I’m kind of perfecting our own homemade southern cornbread…well I might not be using the boxed cornbread mix for a while.
Speaking of perfecting our own homemade cornbread….who knew that it was be so hard to get the right combination for great cornbread.
I had read so many recipes and cookbooks while consulting my grandmother’s recipe cards, I thought that it would be a piece of cake. I was mistaken. While I did end up coming up with a fantastic southern cornbread recipe that we’re probably going to use from here on out, it took a few trials and errors.
The first batch I made had way too much cornmeal. I kept reading that “true southern” cornbread doesn’t have flour. Well…..let me tell you something, corn bread without flour is dark, weird and taste like a dense sponge. Sorry but that isn’t ANY kind of cornbread that I’ve had in the south.
But if you like it like that, be my guest haha. I’ll be over here adding flour to mine.
Next, the debate and trial of cornbread with sugar came about. At first I was totally against sugar going in the cornbread.
I just knew that I didn’t want sugar in there, well until I made a few batches without sugar and realized that I was missing that little kiss of sweetness.
Back to the drawing board for me.
Finally, after corneal and flour combinations, switching the oil out for real butter, adding sugar and an extra egg, we had a winner.
This is what I’m going to now refer to as southern cornbread. This is the southern cornbread that I remember from childhood. It’s the cornbread that I remember from cook outs and BBQs.
It’s got a crispy browned outside while the inside is dense but soft. It crumbles just enough but not too much and it has that little kiss of sweetness.
Slice it hot and top it with a pat of butter for a bite into cornbread heaven. <— ok maybe that was going too far but you get the drift. 😉
I prefer making my cornbread in a cast iron skillet, mainly because I love the crispy brown crust that I get from adding the batter to a hot skillet and well because it’s cast iron…haha who doesn’t want to cook with cast iron. 😉
Even when I use to use the boxed mix, I wanted to cook my cornbread in cast iron. I just think it makes for a better cornbread.
Which reminds me, I need to find a cast iron muffin tin. I personally love cornbread in muffin form haha but since I don’t have a cast iron muffin tin, I’ve been sticking with the cast iron skillets and the cast iron corn bread pans.
Corn Bread Pans
, you know, those cast iron pans that look like they have little slots for ears of corn, those things can be found in almost every antique shop out there.
So until I find a cast iron muffin tin to invest in I’ll probably just stick to corn bread in a cast iron skillet.
If I make it in the cast iron skillet I can at least cut it into triangles or squares because if I can’t have my cornbread in muffin form I want it in squares! haha.
Southern Cornbread – Southern Skillet Cornbread
There is just something warm and comforting about a plate of warm southern cornbread and a softened stick of butter sitting on the table.
Ingredients
- 1 stick of butter (1/2 cup)
- 1 cup yellow cornmeal
- 1 cup flour (all purpose)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 2 eggs
- 2 cups of buttermilk**I used a 10 inch cast skillet*
Instructions
- Pre-heat oven to 450F.
- Melt 5 tablespoons of the butter in a sauce pan or in the microwave. Let the butter cool.
- Place the oven proof skillet or cast iron skillet into the oven.
- In a large bowl, mix together the cornmeal, flour, baking soda, salt and sugar.
- Whisk the eggs into the cool butter and then whisk in the buttermilk.
- Whisk the buttermilk mixture into the cornmeal mixture and stir until combined. There may still be a few lumps but for the most part it should be smooth.
- After the skillet has been in the oven for about 10 minutes or so while you were working on the batter, carefully remove it from the oven.
- Add the last few tablespoons of butter and swirl it around the pan while it melts.
- Once the butter is melted and all over the pan, pour the batter into the super hot pan.
- Stick it back into the oven and bake for 25 minutes.
- Remove from oven and let cool in the skillet for 10 minutes. Flip it out onto a cool rack or plate.
LOVE southern cornbread. I don’t put sugar in mine, but I do occasionally enjoy a sweeter cornbread. 🙂 Looks delicious!
My batter was very thin, was is supposed to be? It’s in the oven now so I hope it turns out. Thanks for recipe.
It should turn out just fine 🙂 When I make it the batter it’s not like water but it’s not super thick like if it was just boxed cornbread mix.
I used regular buttermilk versus low-fat and one was not thin. If that helps.
Nope, cornbread batter is not supposed to be thin. There’s twice as much milk in this recipe than is required. Also, one egg is sufficient. This was more like a custard. I threw the whole thing away.
Richard, did you bake it or did you just toss it and waste the ingredients before you baked it because you thought it was too thin? You can see from the photos that it is indeed cornbread and not custard.
Make this corn bread today to go with some pulled pork and coleslaw. Delicious bread! Sooooo much better than the box version! Thanks
I’m so glad that you liked it!
Angie, thanks for sharing this recipe. I have made it several times and think it has the right ratio of flour:cornmeal and sweetness when I increase the sugar to 2-3 tablespoons. Utah folks think cornbread should look and taste like yellow cake. My good friend from Memphis has informed us “that is not real cornbread”. She gave me what she thought was her mothers recipe and I made it and determined if the Mormon Pioneers needed a replacement for a wagon wheel I had cornbread substitute. With more questions and investigation, I found out her mother used a cornbread mix. Now it was my turn to say “thats not real cornbread”. I have made your recipe with 2 tablespoons of sugar for her and we both agree, “thats real cornbread”!
My husband is not a fan of baking powder, so the baking soda makes him happy too.
Oh my gosh, a replacement for a wagon wheel hahaha. That’s so funny! I’m so glad that you like the cornbread recipe! I’ve found that cornbread is “perfect” 100 different ways depending on where you’re living haha.
Hi,
I plan on making your recipe. One thing I remember from my ex boyfriends mom was she would cook in cast iron pan and the last say ten minutes she’d start airing the bottom using a spatula to lift the bread little at a time, rotating around as it finished baking. I have never tried it. Also bacon grease on the skillet would be yum. I’m going to go for it. Wish me luck!
oh, that’s a neat trick! I’ll have to try that!
So, did you try the “airing ” the bottom of the bread as suggested? I tired it but didn’t compare it with a non aired version. It came out lovely. So If I don’t need to disturb it (although that is so quaint it is tempting to have that on the recipie) I won’t keep doing it.
Disappointing. But I got down to the buttermilk, and realized I didn’t have any, and couldn’t get any quickly in the midst of a pandemic. Without it, it’s pretty bad. Not edible. I substituted plain 2% milk instead (all I had). Surprised it would make that much difference. May try again with buttermilk and maybe toss in some frozen corn for texture. It’s pretty bland.
Dirk,
2% milk corn bread would indeed be awful! Please don’t do that. No wonder it tasted bad. Buttermilk is extremely different than 2% milk. The acid in the buttermilk is what activates the baking soda in the recipe. Without that reaction of the acid from the buttermilk that would indeed make some disgusting cornbread.
You can also add a tablespoon of white vinegar to milk and it works just fine.
However, I followed this recipe to the t and it came out as an egg custard on the top and a thin hard cornbread on the bottom.
I’m not sure why that happened. I use this recipe every time I make cornbread and I’ve never had that happen. I wonder what caused it? Could it have been the baking soda? If the baking soda is expired it wouldn’t rise completely
You can make your own buttermilk with 1 cup milk and 1 t. lemon juice. Works best with whole milk.
I love the texture of this cornbread! I had to sub soured milk for buttermilk because it’s hard to find right now but it worked just fine. We like ours sweeter so I increased the sugar to about 1/3 cup the second time I made it. Turned out great.
So glad that you liked it!
You can also substitute kefir for the buttermilk. Works great.
This recipe sounds delicious! Do you happen to know if I could refrigerate half of the batter to bake a few days later? Not sure if that would affect the result.
Thanks!
Hi Hannah! Since this is a quick bread instead of a yeast bread, I think you’ll end up loosing all the leavening in the batter before the leftover batter is baked. The max rest time would be about 30 minutes.
This is the 2nd time I have made this exact recipe. I will crumble it and add celery, quality free range sausage, spices and herbs and know it will make an excellent turkey stuffing as it did last year. I like the fact that it is savory, not sweet. I urge all not cut corners, use full fat buttermilk, slow ground corn meal (sweeter). Loving it.
I’m so glad to hear that you love it! I may have to try to make a stuffing with it!
Very rich and tasty cornbread! I prefer a bit sweeter flavor and will likely double the sugar next preparation, but my dinner guests enjoyed the recipe greatly accompaniment to a vegetarian chili soup. I did not have any cast-iron available, rather chose an 10.5” stainless skillet as a viable substitute. Cheers to Angie for sharing this recipe!
I added bacon grease to the pan instead of the butter. ???? it didn’t stick to my cast iron skillet. and I probably should have done 2 small eggs as to 2 large. But it was moist and delicious! Kudos to you for this great recipe. I will keep it for sure ❤
so glad that you liked it! What a great idea to use the bacon grease!!
Wow this was amazing! I’ve been reading the little house on the prairie books and had a hankering for savory cornbread, I grew up with jiffy box cornbread so I didn’t know if I would like it not sweet, but I love it! I will make this one over and over again! It’s perfect as is without any extra butter or toppings. Thank you so much for the great recipe 🙂