TGIF dinner October 18, 2024

[Andy M.]

Actually, southerners don't agree on what's true cornbread. Is it sweet, or not?

I like sweet cornbread, while I know some people who call that "corncake." Jalapeño cornbread is popular in North Texas, but I'm not a big fan.

I'm like a lot of people down here, I'm okay with Jiffy corn muffin mix. I make mine from scratch because cornbread is really easy to make, and I always have the ingredients in my pantry, but I don't look down my nose at people who make it from that blue and white box. Homemade is better, but not night-and-day better.

CD

I agree Jiffy's not bad.
The recipe I use is a sweeter cornbread that f\calls for cooking it in a CI skillet. I adapted it to large muffin tins so I could freeze them individually for easy breakfast muffins or for a chili side dish.

 

[caseydog]

I agree Jiffy's not bad.
The recipe I use is a sweeter cornbread that f\calls for cooking it in a CI skillet. I adapted it to large muffin tins so I could freeze them individually for easy breakfast muffins or for a chili side dish.

I agree Jiffy's not bad.
The recipe I use is a sweeter cornbread that f\calls for cooking it in a CI skillet. I adapted it to large muffin tins so I could freeze them individually for easy breakfast muffins or for a chili side dish.

I've baked my cornbread in a few different pans, but my favorite is my 1920's era Griswold #8 cast iron pan. I'm sure it is all in my head, but it tastes better.

CD

 

[medtran49]

Blissful's recipe doesn't have any water in it.

For 4 cups of dried beans I put in 1 cup diced onion, 3/4 cup diced peppers, 4 mince garlic cloves and
3/4 cup molasses
1/2 cup honey (or similar amount of sugar)
3/4 cup of ketchup
3 T vinegar
2 t worcestershire sauce
1 t salt (optional)
2 t hot sauce (optional)
and I like a few tablespoons of dijon mustard in it too.
If you use a lesser amount of beans, use less of the sauce ingredients.

You have to use some kind of liquid to cook dried beans, whether it's water, broth, stock, beer, etc. Beans absorb water when they cook, besides all the water they have absorbed while soaking.

Frankly, I don't know how Bliss's recipe works. If it works for her as posted above, i.e. no additional liquid, that's great, but every other recipe I've found from sites I trust, calls for added liquid of some kind so that the beans would have liquid to absorb. I've used dried Great Northerns in other types of recipes and they ALL have called for what you would think is excess liquid because the beans absorb some and some evaporates away while cooking.

I suspect you either got a bag of old beans that would need pressure cooking to soften, or the long, under temperature cooking they were subjected to somehow caused the skin to harden so the beans couldn't absorb liquid.

Oh, and you certainly don't add cornstarch while beans are cooking regardless. Doing that thickens the liquid too much and they are never going to absorb it.

All those extra sugary things that were added didn't help much either. The extra sugars probably hardened the skin even more.

This kind of reminds me of when my friend's husband, who really didn't cook, decided to make chili while she was at work. He followed her slow and low cooking recipe, with lots of liquid at the start, but tasted it shortly after it started cooking and felt it didn't have enough kick or salt, so added more salt and more chile powder. Did that a couple more times, then decided it was good. By the time it finished cooking a couple of hours later, it was inedible because of the salt and spice...