What Makes a southern cornbread

The thing that distinguishes southerly cornbread from, say Yankee cornbread, or any other cornbread one is probably to eat outside of the southerly states, is that it is savory, not sweet, and it is made mostly with cornmeal .

Northern cornbreads tend to be more cake-like, on the sweet slope, with a fine crumb due to more flour in the concoction. southerly cornbread is flavored with bacon dirt, and cooked in a vomit cast-iron frying pan, a perfective side for barbecues, or chili. It besides tends to be rather crumbly .

Elise Bauer

A Cornbread experiment

With this cornbread recipe, we experimented both with all cornmeal, and with just three-quarters cornmeal and one-fourth flour. We besides experimented with including or leaving out an egg .

Result: Either direction works ! Though the interpretation with some of the cornmeal swapped out with flour, and including an egg, holds together better and is a little more tender .

Elise Bauer

About This Cornbread Recipe

If you are newly to making southerly cornbread, take note of the follow :

Sugar Is optional

Whether to include sugar or not in a southerly cornbread recipe is an issue for argument. We ‘ve included as an option a tablespoon which just intensifies the spirit of the cornmeal ; it does n’t make the cornbread angelic .

The choice is yours as to whether or not to include it. ( See this excellent article from good Eats on why traditional southern cornbread does not include sugar. )

“All cornmeal” versus “cornmeal and flour”

You can either use all cornmeal or a combination of cornmeal and flour to make this cornbread. If you go the all cornmeal route, note that the result will likely be very, very crumbly. That ‘s barely how the Southern cornbread crumbles. If you would like cornbread with a little more structure, I recommend using a combination of cornmeal and flour .

Why Use Bacon Drippings and Butter

You ‘ll notice there are both bacon drippings and butter in this cornbread recipe. The butter adds needed affluence to the bread itself, and the bacon drippings help brown the crust, keep it from sticking to the frying pan, and add a adorable bacon spirit to the bread .

Make Cornbread in a Cast Iron Skillet

ultimately, the method that works best with using a well-seasoned mold iron frying pan is to preheat the frying pan with the fatty and then add the buffet to the hot frying pan. This helps brown the crust and with the pan already hot, the cornbread cooks more promptly .

Need to season your cast iron pan? Check out this guidebook to seasoning mold iron .

To our fine readers from our southern states, how do you like your cornbread ? Please let us know in the comments .