# Question about Corn Bread
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [June 14, 2020, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645 "2020-06-14T03:16:26Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@DorkVader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DorkVader)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/1 "2020-06-14T03:16:26Z")
Going to make cornbread using Bob’s Red Mill medium grind cornmeal and the recipe on the back of the bag. Said recipe calls for the use of an 8x8 baking pan, but I’ve decided that since I have this wonderfully seasoned cast iron pan, I oughta use it. The recipe calls for 25-30 minutes bake time and toothpick test. What adjustments, if any, should I make for changing from a baking pan to cast iron pan?
---
### Author:  [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/2 "2020-06-14T04:25:38Z")
[This recipe](https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alexandra-guarnaschelli/cast-iron-skillet-corn-bread-recipe-2012669) looks pretty similar to [Bob’s Red Mill recipe](https://www.bobsredmill.com/recipes/how-to-make/cornbread/) in ingredient amounts, but uses a 9" cast iron skillet. It calls for preheating the pan at 425 and then reducing to 375 and baking for 20-25 minutes.
Note the step about putting butter into the hot pan. This gives the bread a buttery, crunchy crust that’s freaking delicious and is my favorite part of the corn bread.
---
### Author:  [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/3 "2020-06-14T04:32:36Z")
Always preheat the skillet. The butter in the skillet is personal preference. I like a small ammt. of bacon grease. YMMV.
The best way is to watch the bread the first few times you cook it. I can tell by smell when mine is done. We like a tiny bit of char on the edge.
Just watch it for color on top. A nice golden brown and it’s done.
---
### Author:  [@Rhiannon8404](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhiannon8404)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/4 "2020-06-14T04:35:01Z")
When I started making my corn bread in my cast iron skillet instead of the 8x8 Pyrex, the only change I made was putting the pan in the oven when I started preheating. Then when I’m ready to put the batter in the pan, I put some oil or butter in to coat the pan and then the batter. I cook for the amount of time and at the same temperature as the recipe. I use this recipe: [Alber’s Cornmeal](http://alberscorn.com/albers-corn-bread/)
---
### Author:  [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/5 "2020-06-14T04:37:34Z")
pork cracklins are also good on the top but i think you add those after you take it ut … now here’s where I’m a heathen… thanks to Marie callendar i like my cornbread sweet …
---
### Author:  [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 6:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/6 "2020-06-14T06:01:35Z")
That’s not cornbread.
• It contains a shitload of flour. Flour doesn’t belong in cornbread.
• It contains freaking SUGAR. Bleagh!
Real cornbread doesn’t have flour or sugar in it. Pork cracklin’s are allowed, as are jalapeño peppers and occasionally kernels of whole corn.
I can give you a real recipe if you want one.
---
### Author:  [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 7:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/7 "2020-06-14T07:09:10Z")
We call Jiffy mix or any of the other pouch type cornbread mixes ‘breakfast cornbread’. My kids love it. They eat it with syrup.
---
### Author:  [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/8 "2020-06-14T12:51:40Z")
> [@AHunter3](#):
>
> That’s not cornbread.
>
> • It contains a shitload of flour. Flour doesn’t belong in cornbread.
>
> • It contains freaking SUGAR. Bleagh!
>
> Real cornbread doesn’t have flour or sugar in it. Pork cracklin’s are allowed, as are jalapeño peppers and occasionally kernels of whole corn.
>
> I can give you a real recipe if you want one.
Well, as long as it’s real cornbread, and not what people have been eating and calling cornbread for generations, I guess you’re the expert.
---
### Author:  [@DorkVader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DorkVader)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/9 "2020-06-14T13:06:17Z")
Love the jiffy mixes.
I do have an actual cornbread recipe somewhere that would satisfy AHunter, but I’m not going to be the only one eating this. I’m probably one of the most adventerous gustatory explorers I know, but I also have a houseful of rather finicky, conservative food snobs that I feed now and then. So Bob’s(recipe) ma cornbread for now.
---
### Author:  [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/10 "2020-06-14T13:10:45Z")
FWIW, the sugar-in-cornbread debate has a [fascinating racial history](https://www.charlotteobserver.com/living/food-drink/article68763427.html).
---
### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/11 "2020-06-14T13:20:40Z")
Huh, I always thought that was a North vs. South thing, not a racial thing. I guess Northerners got sweet cornbread from the African-American diaspora.
And for the record, all cornbread is a bit sweet, even if it has no added sugar. Corn is itself naturally sweet.
---
### Author:  [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/12 "2020-06-14T14:05:27Z")
> [@AHunter3](#):
>
> That’s not cornbread.
>
> • It contains a shitload of flour. Flour doesn’t belong in cornbread.
>
> • It contains freaking SUGAR. Bleagh!
>
> Real cornbread doesn’t have flour or sugar in it. Pork cracklin’s are allowed, as are jalapeño peppers and occasionally kernels of whole corn.
>
> I can give you a real recipe if you want one.
I’ll be you’re fun at a party.
---
### Author:  [@VOW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VOW)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/13 "2020-06-14T15:21:07Z")
> [@Beckdawrek](#):
>
> Always preheat the skillet. The butter in the skillet is personal preference. I like a small ammt. of bacon grease. YMMV.
>
> The best way is to watch the bread the first few times you cook it. I can tell by smell when mine is done. We like a tiny bit of char on the edge.
> Just watch it for color on top. A nice golden brown and it’s done.
I love you, Beck!
I was raised on bacon grease. If you want to fry anything, use bacon grease. Rub it on the outside of your potatoes before baking. And of COURSE you grease the skillet before baking corn bread, using bacon grease!
When the “Medical Authorities” educated folks about bad fats and good fats, and fat contributing to heart disease, the cup holding bacon grease got retired. Fried potatoes never tasted quite as good as they used to!
I even have memories of Momma trimming the fat off pork chops, before cooking them. That fat was chopped up and fried in a little skillet. Momma scooped out the little crunchy bits and sprinkled savor salt on them, and my sister and I thought they were little bites of heaven. The grease was poured into the bacon grease cup.
We don’t use bacon grease any more. But by God, when the “Medical Authorities” declared that margarine really, truly was NOT a healthy alternative to actual butter, I led the margarine revolt! It has been real butter in my house ever since!
Sometimes, though, I miss that little metal cup of bacon grease…
~VOW
---
### Author:  [@DorkVader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DorkVader)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/14 "2020-06-14T15:51:59Z")
Mah sistah!
Margerine no longer has a place in my house either. Finally weaned the Dorkling off the vile stuff by buying the worst cheapest crap available once or twice and then just not buying it anymore. The ex preferred margerine over butter…hmmm!
Anyway, unsalted butter only in this household. Alas, I do have one moral failing, I don’t eat enough bacon to actually ever buy any. Otherwise yes, I’d have the small coffee can of “bacon drippins”(thats what Gma Vader wrote on a piece of masking tape to label said can) that was so familiar in 3 different households during my childhood.
---
### Author:  [@VOW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VOW)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/15 "2020-06-14T16:23:23Z")
_hugs Dork_
We have bacon, but we cheat. We buy the big honkin’ package of Hormel cooked bacon at Sam’s Club. Frying, by definition, is messy, messy business. The Hormel stuff lets somebody else make the frying mess!
Two slices of the Hormel bacon are a perfectly acceptable serving sodium-wise, for Mr VOW’s breakfast. Back in the Bad Old Days, Mr VOW could fry up a whole pound of regular bacon, make a terrible mess, and then feast on the entire fried up pound.
(And then walk away, expecting the mess to clean up all by itself, but I digress…)
~VOW
---
### Author:  [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/16 "2020-06-14T18:07:28Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#):
>
> Note the step about putting butter into the hot pan. This gives the bread a buttery, crunchy crust that’s freaking delicious and is my favorite part of the corn bread.
I use Crisco in my cast-iron pan. And yes, the crispy bottom and sides are nice.
---
### Author:  [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/17 "2020-06-14T18:32:46Z")
I was looking up some Portuguese recipes last night and came across a yeast-risen round cornbread loaf that does include wheat flour with the cornmeal. It sounded damn good as an accompaniment to something like Caldo verde, and I’d try it.
It’s not my southern skillet cornbread baked without wheat or sweetener. An entirely different thing, like Chicago deep-dish vs. New York pizza.
---
### Author:  [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/18 "2020-06-14T18:42:53Z")
I still fry my taters in bacon fat, and there is a rotating plastic container of the stuff in the freezer. We have bacon nearly every day, so I just dump the fat into it. After about a week, I turn it over, smack it on the counter, and the frozen fat falls out and gets put in the compost bin. Honestly, unless you’re drinking the stuff, it’s not going to hurt you. Like most everything, moderation is key.
---
### Author:  [@DorkVader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DorkVader)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/19 "2020-06-14T21:26:08Z")
Well, not “drinking” it per sé,
Ahem
But aaaaahhhh, I have been known to stand there dipping bread into the pan once the cooking is done and slurping it
---
### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2020, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645/20 "2020-06-14T22:28:01Z")
While some fats are better or worse than others, there’s not actually that much variation between them: For the most part, fat is fat. But some fats are _much_ tastier than others. Bacon has a far higher tasty to artery-cloggy ratio than most fats. So yeah, it’s good, and if you’re worried, just eat a little less of it. A little bit less bacon grease is a lot better than a lot of canola or the like.
[Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-about-corn-bread/855645.md?page=2)