Authentic Southern-type cornbread recipe for Screeme

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Okay, kids, Screeme felt left out on the “Disgusting Foods” thread due to a lifetime of eating sweetened corn muffins. I maintained that genuine Southern-style cornbread is not sweet, and promised to get a recipe for him/her.

Here 'tis.

2 cups unsifted yellow corn meal
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 teaspoons baking powder
2 eggs (optional)
1 cup milk
1 1/2 tablespoons bacon grease

Mix dry ingredients. Add milk, beaten eggs and bacon grease. Beat well. Pour into 8 inch square greased pan. Bake 25 minutes at 375 or until done (Bread is done if center springs back when touched lightly with finger).

My mother also pointed out that, for texture, what should be used is a cast-iron skillet, preferably one that has its cooking surface divided in two. Coat the cooking surface with bacon grease and heat it up on the stove top, then pour the batter in and pop it in the oven. This gives the bread an amazing crust that is positively addicting.

Another excellent touch is cooking sausage patties and burying them in the batter. They cook right into the bread and make for an incredibly good breakfast or even lunch. Obviously, this is not a recipe that people watching their cholesterol or blood pressure should indulge in too much. But, like everything else that’s bad for you, it’s sooooo good!

You may want to experiment with the amount of bacon grease you use. But don’t put any sweetener in the batter. You can sop some honey or maple syrup while you’re eating, though. That’s allowed.

Enjoy!

2

ahhh… you are the MAN!

I’m gonna go buy some corn meal and give this a go! Thanks man!!!

Screeme

3

Everyone knows that you make true Southern style cornbread
with pork cracklin’ and buttermilk…

4

Nice Southern recipe, DAVE. Whaddaya givin us, here, the South Bronx? Geddadda the kitchen and I’ll show yez how we make cornbread in Brooklyn!

1 cup stoneground cornmeal (white is traditionally Southern)
1/2 tsp cream of tartar
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp sea salt
1 egg
3/4 cup buttermilk
1 tbsp lard or rendered bacon grease

Preheat oven to 425.

Place dry ingredients in a small mixing bowl and whisk together a few times to combine. Beat the egg lightly and add it to the buttermilk.

Five minutes before you’re ready to bake, place the fat in an 8-inch seasoned iron skillet and put it in the oven. At about the four-minute mark, beat the egg and buttermilk into the dry ingredients to just combine. Remove the (hot!) skillet from the oven and swirl the grease around, making sure the bottom and sides are coated. Pour and remaining grease into the batter (it will sizzle), and give it a quick stir to combine. Pour the batter into the hot skillet, return it to the oven, and bake for 20 minutes. Take it out and quickly and confidentally invert the pan over a cutting board.

I usually put black pepper in this, too. Or, as kiffa says, you can add cracklings. If you’re planning on eating the cornbread with honey or jam, of course, you can leave these out. But I usually have it on the side of soupy butter beans (or pintos) cooked with onion and red pepper, so I go the savory route.

This recipe feeds four as a side dish, and is about as quick and easy and boiling a pot of pasta. Whip through it a couple of times and you’ll get it down pat; fresh cornbread can become a dinnertime staple.

The above recipe was cheerfully stolen from John Thorne’s brilliant book of cookery and food belles lettres, SERIOUS PIG. John Thorne is from saltwater Maine.

(All our Southeastern SDMB correspondents are now reminded that you should stop laughing long enough to breathe. Serious physical damage may result unless you stop laughing long enough to breathe.)

5

OK, Ike, I’m busted. No doubt your recipe is more authentic than mine. I bow to your culinary prowess.

The main thing is, I wanted Screeme and others to know that those mass-produced, ersatz, sweetened cupcake-cum-muffins are not in any way representative of cornbread as the Good Lord and Robert E. Lee meant it to be. I promised Screeme that I would get a recipe that would let him know what real cornbread is supposed to taste like.

In my haste, I didn’t consider the fact that my mother, for health reasons, has not made real down home, set-a-spell, artery-blocking South’n cornpone for years and therefore doesn’t have a recipe. We were reduced to working basically from a recipe on the back of a sack of cornmeal and her memory of how her father would make it.

No one loves to start with a basic recipe and diddle around with it more than I, but I felt a duty to this board to post a recipe that didn’t include white flour and processed sugar. You would have to agree that, although basic, my recipe is a decent starting point. Sort of a “training bread”, if you will. The finer points can come later.

I’m grateful that you did post a superior recipe, and if it means that others will know the joy of true cornbread, my job is done. I humbly accept all the japes, jeers and snide backhand comments regarding my recipe. I am honored that my contribution has opened the way for culinary and gustatory excellence.

Now shut up.

6

If you use sugar and flour in cornbread, it’s called Johnny Cake. Marie Callendars cornbread is more like Johnny Cake. Made right, it’s very good. But it ain’t cornbread.
Both recipes above are authentic. Southern cooking varies widely, even within a specific region. I myself hail from southern Bakersfield.
And you can call the skillet a “Spider”.
Peace,
mangeorge
BTW; Lard is great for cooking. Good for pie crust, in biscuits, and many other things. Try deep-frying french fries in lard. Yum.

7

Give credit where credit is due. I posted my 2 cents worth before Ukulele Ike [some Southern name that is…southern Oahu?] yet you give him the credit without mentioning me. Remember that my original name was PEACHES??? a true Southern nickname. Did you give him honor because he has three gazzillion postings and I have only 200+?

8

Take a slice of that cold cornbread out of the fridge, split it, fry both halves in butter, cover with milk and some maple syrup, and enjoy.
Peace,
mangeorge.

9

No, kiffa, although I didn’t reply to your post, I recognized the all-important buttermilk factor. But Ike had the juice to post an entire recipe, rather than an addendum.

Also, I’ve met Ike and know him to be a fine fellow of great good humor and worth paying heed when it comes to beer, music, literature and matters culinary.

mangeorge, while I have much respect and affection for lard, it cannot hold a candle to actual bacon or sausage drippin’s for use as shortening in cornbread batter. Thanx, BTW for backing up my recipe. After Ike’s post I was starting to think the only thing it had going for it in the way of Southern cooking was the fact that it came from the mouth of a Tennessee gal. I see you are not lacking either in a discriminating palate.

Thanks.

10

Hmmmm… thats alright, but it could use a touch of sugar or honey…

11

If you want sweet with your cornbread, you can pour soppin’ syrup on it.

Ike’s recipe is certified true southern. Dave, you’re close, but not quite.

For those that want a little bit of variety, you can try putting chopped chilies and a handful of grated cheese in your cornbread, that’s good too.

Cooking it in a cast iron pan is the way to go; it makes the crust crustier . . . and the inside tender and light.

Damn, now I’m hungry.

your humble TubaDiva
certified Southern Belle . . . some days just plain certified.

PS Next time, let’s talk biscuits.

[Edited by TubaDiva on 07-06-2000 at 10:38 PM]

12

Stoneground cornmeal? Sea salt?
I think, TubaDiva, that you’re talkin’ big house eats.
We’re sittin’ a spell down here in the shanty house. :smiley:
Biscuits. Mmmm.
2 cups flour
1 fat tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup lard or butter
3/4 cup+ buttermilk
Mix dry ingredients well in a large bowl.
Cut in grease, till crumbly.
Gently mix in just enough bmilk to moisten well. S/B sticky.
Turn out on a well floured board.
Gently form (pat) into a mass about 3/4 in. thick, cut with a can opened on both ends. Put in a pan with edges touching. A cake pan is best.
Bake in a hot (450 deg. or so) over till nicely browned, about 10-15 mins. A HOT oven and the color are more important than the time. Never over-handle after adding liquid.
Eat right away with too much butter and your favorite jam.
No other food required, 'cept if you have company. Good with coffee.
Peace,
mangeorge

13

:: stage whisper :: Tuba, I thought we agreed we weren’t going to talk about that on the MB!

Honest, folks, she meant the food.

Really.