I'm kind of picky about cornbread. I grew up eating muffins made from a Marie Callender's mix,* so I always assumed cornbread was sweet--almost cake-like. Years later, I was bewildered the first few times I tried baking cornbread from scratch. The recipes I used produced grainy stuff that tasted a lot like cornmeal, and nothing like the cakey muffins I was used to. Perhaps those recipes were more traditional than Marie's ambrosia, but they certainly weren't anything I was eager to eat on a regular basis.
For a while I tried to satisfy my cornbread craving with the just-add-water mixes at the grocery store. They'll do in a pinch, but deep in my soul I knew there must be a simple recipe out there for the type of sweet cornbread I'd grown up with. At last I could stand it no longer, and I logged onto tasteofhome.com. I've had good luck with them in the past, and after sifting through their cornbread recipes I found a simple one that looked promising.
The recipe's title was "Buttery Corn Bread," and it sure lived up to its name. The flavor was pretty good, but I wasn't sure how I felt about bread that leaves a grease spot on my plate. I tried making it a second time, decreasing the butter and tweaking a few other things, and viola! perfect cornbread (as far as this household is concerned, anyway). It may not be exactly what the pioneers would have baked, but they didn't have indoor plumbing, either, and I'm certainly not forgoing THAT for the sake of tradition.
If you'd like to try Sweet Cornbread for yourself, I just added the recipe to our website. It calls for just a few basic ingredients you're likely to have on hand, and it's a breeze to make. And in my humble opinion, it would go very nicely with Rainbow Chicken Chili.
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*Note: The Marie mix my mom used to use called for a few additional ingredients, like eggs. These days I can only find the just-add-water Marie mix, and it just ain't the same. I know - life's so tough . . . :)
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5 comments:
Have you tried the JIFFY brand. (Corn muffin mix) You add egg and milk and extra butter if you want. Try it! It's only 40 cents. It's good for storage also. My family loves it. We also add sweet corn to ours once in awhile. We are going to try yours. It's always fun to experiment. The kids love making cornbread.
awesome ... i'm gonna have to try it. i personally love cornbread, but robby doesn't. so if i make it, i guess its up to me and aidan to eat it all.
and total side note, but it bugs me that the site where you host your recipes doesn't have rss feed. weird preference, sorry!
Jodi, our site is still in the development stage. I'll ask Phillip if it's possible to set up and RSS feed for it.
Serena, I haven't tried Jiffy in a while; perhaps I'll have to give it a whirl. I like knowing I can make things from scratch, but if a shortcut tastes just as good I'm all in favor of saving time. :)
Jiffy is also our favorite boxed mix. Otherwise, the recipe from the Better Homes and Garden cookbook is really good.
yum...we're going to love trying it. my husband and i love cornbread...but sadly, we share yourlament.
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