Anytime we ever eat with my grandparents we always have cornbread with the meal. Supper isn’t ready until the cornbread is made and you wouldn’t dare have a meal without it.
I’ve mentioned before that my grandmother cans and freezes vegetables from her garden for us (and everyone else she knows), it’s what she loves to do. They plant an enormous garden and spend countless hours tending to it and we all love the veggies that come from it.
And don’t think this is all The Little Red Hen and we just want to enjoy the fruits of someone else’s labor. Oh, no. I have vivid memories of cleaning corn and shelling peas as a child. Even more recently when my Nanny told me we would be “picking a little corn and putting it up,” 112 ears (yes 112, I counted) and one whole day later my work was finished (and we had corn for months).
But now I’m sidetracked and I’m really only here to give you a recipe for cornbread. So back to the point we go. After I got married to Allen I decided that I wanted to make cornbread at home. So one evening when we were eating dinner with Nanny and Papaw I asked for the recipe. Sure, said my Papaw, Actually I’ll do even better than that, I’ll show you.
And so he did.
As he was taking whole handfuls of flour and corn meal from enormous popcorn canisters, he gave me this recipe.
And because this recipe was never going to work for me I was already asking questions like:
Do you think that’s about a cup?
Have you ever measured this out?
I think I’m going to need you to write this down for me, okay?
Wait, how much buttermilk did you just pour in there?
But aren’t your handfuls are bigger than mine? How will this be right?
And because he thought it was completely crazy that I needed a recipe, because come on, who would need a recipe for cornbread? We live in Alabama for crying out loud, isn’t there a cornbread festival or statue of the cornbread around here? And of course, anyone who is anyone is making it for dinner every evening, so why would they need a recipe? I digress.
But low and behold, somehow between the handful recipe from my grandfather and a phone call to my mom (which didn’t go much different than the conversation with my grandfather as she was trying to relay the same handful measurements from my dad who was calling them out to her from across the room), I made this little gem…
I so wish I could give you a recipe with exact measurements but it seems that the art of fine cornbread making is not to be constrained by measurements.
All measurements are approximate:
3/4 cup self-rising flour
1 1/2 c corn meal
2 eggs
1 c buttermilk
oil
**I originally planned to use a little less than a cup of buttermilk but it turned out too thick so I added more**
Preheat the oven to 350 and add a few tablespoons of oil to an iron skillet. Let the oil get hot in the skillet while you’re preparing the mixture. When the batter is ready pour it into the greased skillet and bake about 30-35 minutes or until the top is browned.
Heating the oil beforehand and cooking it in a cast-iron skillet is key, or so I’ve been told.
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This is exactly how my grandmother (we’re also from AL) makes it, too. 🙂