Corn Bread: Breakfast in a slice.

CBFancyShotCorn Bread: Breakfast in a slice.

This is recipe #10 (1/4 of the way there! [almost]) in [easyazon-link asin=”1580082688″]The Bread Baker’s Apprentice[/easyazon-link] Challenge.

By now we know the drill: look up the recipe, translate the ounce weights to grams for better accuracy and get all our ingredients set up for the Mis en Place. So let’s get this show going.

Wait!! Before we get going, there’s the overnight soak we need to attend to. So our coarse (palenta style) cornmeal gets a bath of buttermilk and left on the counter until next day. Straight forward to not need photos, right? Good, cause I didn’t get any.

So one full sleep later…

The ubiquitous Mis en Place. Althought there are  a fair number of ingredients here, the process is really simple.

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WAIT!! Hold on, we’re already ahead of ourselves. A step we did before getting all the ingredients ready and measured was to cook up our bacon, about 15-20 at 375ºF on a parchment covered baking sheet. Book says use two, but there was plenty of spare space on one sheet. I even used 10 ounces of bacon to not leave one lonely slice in the package (and get in deep doodoo for it too)

So out of the oven it came, the drippings saved and the bacon placed on towels to soak up grease.

Issue: I didn’t know until later but we had thick sliced bacon. Seems they should have cooked longer than the suggested 15-20. They were cooked, just not totally crispy. Oh well.

OK, let’s carry on…

What we’ll be making here is basically a batter poured into a pan. No kneading, proofing or yeat building required. Told you it was easy!

Step 1: mix dry ingredients together.

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Flour, salt, baking soda & powder. Add sugar and brown sugar. Stir.

Did I mention this was easy?

Step 2:

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Mix honey into melted butter; put butter mix into eggs; put egg mix into cornmeal mush; put cornmeal mush into dry ingredients. Stir until well mixed.

Repeat after me: “easy!”

Step 3:

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Add corn to batter and mix until well incorporated.

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Pour bacon fat into 10″ pan (I’m using a 10″ cake pan here) and place in preheated 350º oven 5-7 minutes until “very very hot”.

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While that’s doing that, bust up your bacon into chunky bits. Then take out your very hot pan a la bacon fat and swirl it about to coat the sides with bacon grease.

Mmmmmm bacon grease…

Careful, this really is hot. Note tile on counter.

Next…

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Pour your batter into the very hot pan of very hot bacon grease. The book says to srea the batter to the sides with a spatula. Mine was wet enough to not need coaching at all. Hmmmm wonder why it’s not as thick as suggested?

Spread bacon chunks all over the top. Hint, do it by hand, sprinkling right from the bowl didn’t dread the chunks of bacomy goodness evenly.

Then push the bacon chunks into the batter a little. I suppose to make it harder for bacon thieves to get hold of them.

This puppy is now ready to go into the oven for about 30 minutes at 350º

Tic toc tic toc…

Brrrring! 30 Minutes are up, let’s check it.

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Nuh-uh. This is still rather puddly in the middle. Says the book: 30 minutes, depending on the pan. Well, obviously another pan issue. SO back it goes for 10 more minutes…

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A little more solid but the toothpick test says it’s still wet in the middle. Back for another 10.

Then another five.

Then five more.

And five more again. Geepers, will this bread ever reach 185ºC inside? My answwer, after adding 25 minutes more to the original 30, was “Nope.” 172 0r so and that was good enough . Besides, supper was getting started and I had to get out of the way.

So the bread came out, had a nice colour to it too. Let it cool while dinner was made. Then served up a couple wedges with dinner.

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Verdict: Quite nice. Sadly, not the best cornbread, not as good as “Grandma Pack’s” I was told, but still quite nice.  I never had Granma Pack’s cornbread but I presume it was very good. Ca we get that recipe? I asked

Got a Ouija board? Punkin replies.

Hmmm, I thought, munching the very nice corn bread… That would be a cool book: Recipes from the Dead; a collection of warmly remembered recipes, culled from the afterlife.

OK, enough silly, here’s the Show Stopper:

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Next up in the Challenge:

Cranberry Walnut Bread

Mmmmmmmmm….

12 Replies to “Corn Bread: Breakfast in a slice.”

  1. Great post, will make this later in the week to go with ribs. People have very specific ideas about what makes good cornbread, it will be interesting to see how many bakers actually find that this is the best cornbread they have ever eaten.

  2. Nice looking corn bread. Your photos are great.
    I actually love the taste of traditional corn bread (johnny cake) much better but it was fun to make.
    Great job,
    Susie

  3. I always check your site before I do the week’s bread – this time I learned that I need to plan just in case it takes more time to bake than the book says it will! Thanks for the heads-up.

  4. This is one more bread that puzzles me, I haven’t decided that not being American is an advantage or not in this challenge … I have never eaten corn bread, and would probably never think of trying if it wasn’t for this challenge. On the other hand, I don’t have any prejudiced thoughts about what a “genuine” corn bread should be like!

    I will try though, but will not use bacon since one family member is a vegetarian. Maybe pickled jalapenos instead?

    1. Jalapeño would be a great switch up!
      I’d suggest chopping half of them into smaller bits and mixing in with the batter so it permeates the bread well, then spreading the remaining slices on top.

      Hope it turns out well!

  5. Excellent post and pictures! Funny you call it breakfast in a slice…My husband requested a piece for breakfast this morning. Mine didn’t reach full temp either but I’m assuming it’s because I used frozen corn.

  6. I find it interesting that your cornbread took longer to bake than the book stated. I had to add time to the recipe and it got close to the right temp (180). I also read your posts before I start my bread since I have purposefully lagged a bit in order to learn lessons from the other bakers. Great job.

  7. That looks so yummy! I wonder how it would taste with turkey bacon? (non pork eaters here…) I’ve never made a cornbread with corn in it, how is the texture?

  8. Love the “Recipes from the Dead” idea!! Your cornbread looks yummy. I think the thing about cornbread is that everyone has a favourite recipe against which they will judge this one.

  9. This looks like a great recipe! Here’s another recipe I recently did and really liked.

    Cheddar Skillet Corn Bread http://wp.me/puWta-5D

    It’s particularly nice because you bake it right in a cast iron skillet. Try it out and let me know what you think!

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