Annie's Award-Winning Cornbread

Annie’s Award-Winning Cornbread

For most anyone that has been over to my house for supper, happened upon the same potluck as I was attending, was a judge at the local fair (first place!) or perhaps had a meal delivered after the arrival of a new baby or surgery, there is a very good chance you have tried my cornbread.

My cornbread is one of my go-to recipes. You know, the recipes that you use so much that they are just in your head, never really written down.

I find that it is perfect as a side for any type of soup, any type of roast, grilled meats, etc. I also find that even those picky eaters that are reluctant to try cornbread end up loving this recipe.

Cornbread is a perfect dish to take to potlucks. It won’t spill in the car, leaving that odd, funky smell for months. Your children can be “helpers” by carrying it in to the building and you don’t have to beat down the doors of Heaven praying that they don’t slosh it all over themselves. As I said, a perfect dish. J

Annie’s Award-Winning Cornbread

Mix:

• 1 cup of yellow cornmeal (you can use white if you wish, go ahead and live on the edge.)
• 1 cup flour
• ½ cup raw sugar OR 2/3 cup white sugar. Your choice. We use raw sugar in our home, but hey! Whatever floats your boat! (NOTE: if you forget the sugar, as I have, the cornbread will look beautiful. However, when your husband takes that first bite, an odd expression will come over his face and he will try to quietly inform you of your mistake. You will then have to announce to all concerned parties that you forgot the sugar. They will then eat it anyway because they love you, but they will also hold you to your promise of cornbread WITH sugar the next time.)
• 2 tsp. baking powder

Add:

• 1 cup milk (whatever you have in the fridge is fine. I usually try to use up the older milk. You know, the jug that the kids are now passing over, yet the date is still ok.)
• ¼ cup of butter, melted. After I pour the milk in the bowl, I pop the butter in the measuring cup and then into the microwave. The coating of the milk on the cup helps the butter slide right out of the measuring cup, into the bowl, once it is melted. (NOTE: if you forget the butter, as I have also done, the cornbread will be a little flat and very heavy. Since of course you will not figure this out until you are already IN LINE at the church potluck, your husband will take a HUGE piece and announce how much he loves his wife’s cornbread, in that way saving others from having to eat it. Y’all, I have THE BEST husband.)
• 1 egg

Pour mixture into a greased pie plate. Yes, a pie plate. I find that it cooks the cornbread more evenly, and it is sort of fun to cut that way as well. If you don’t own a pie plate, you can use whatever you have on hand.

Place in an oven that has been preheated to 425 degrees. Bake for 27 minutes. When it is done, you should see slight browning at the edges and small cracks on the top of the cornbread. (NOTE: If you don’t see those two items, stick it back in for a while. Otherwise you get a pan of cornbread that is half raw in the center. While that might work for brownies, it does NOT work for cornbread. At this point, even your loving husband will refuse to eat it and insist it go back into the oven.)

There you have it, easy peasy! For the record, I have made this recipe hundreds of times over the past sixteen years, since I came up with it. Out of those hundreds of times, I have only messed it up three times, all of which I have shared with you here. It is just fine if you mess up. Everything takes practice, including making food for your troops. While it might seem to be a huge mistake at the time, later you will be able to look back and laugh about it, perhaps even telling the world of your major goof ups and how your husband came to the rescue. The main thing is that you TRY. Your family will love you for it, your budget will love you for it, and you will have great satisfaction in a job well done.

As Ted Allen said, “Cooking for people is an enormously significant expression of generosity and soulfulness, and entertaining is a way to be both generous and creative. You are sharing your life with people.”

~Annie