I made the Bread Baker’s Apprentice Challenge cornbread (the only non-yeasted bread in the book) just before leaving on a wonderful vacation to Aspen. I made it, cooled it, then tasted it. (Just enough to learn that it was truly sweet, salty, dense, moist, and full of crunchy bursts of fresh corn.) Now mid-summer is an awfully strange time to make such a hearty cornbread; when we left it was pretty warm here on the Peninsula. Luckily, I threw it into the freezer, and our flight home from Aspen dropped us into weather cool enough for fleece and sweats again. I’ll probably be making some white bean and chicken chili in the next few days as a spicy complement to the cornbread.
I really, really like this cornbread. However, I do have some issues with it. Mainly, look how many bowls/dishes it takes! (And that’s not including the pan it bakes in!)
I mean, this is corn bread we’re talking about here. Not a yeasted, yummy, make everyone fall over with the glorious rise kind-of-bread. Need I remind anyone that I don’t even have a dishwasher?
The first step in making this bread involves soaking coarse cornmeal (polenta) in buttermilk overnight. Then, you bake bacon until it’s crisp. Or in my case, burned enough that you need to throw half of it away, which is just fine. Because my other bone to pick with this generally tasty bread is that I don’t like meat in my bread. Which we already know. And this cornbread uses not only the bacon, but you pour a couple of tablespoons of bacon fat into the pan before you pour in the batter. We’re just not going to worry about clogged arteries this week, not at all. A sane person might ask why I would make another bread with any kind of meat in it after my Casatiello experience, but I’m just going to assume that no sane people actually read this blog, okay? Because the writer of this blog is not sane, either.
Now I realize that there is an entire camp of people who believe that bacon makes everything taste better. I kid you not, this is the cornbread recipe for you. Exactly as written in the book. But I will be making this cornbread, from here on out, without the bacon. At least I’m consistent. Well, with the meat in the bread thing, anyway.
The cornbread batter uses fresh corn, which is in good supply right now, and transforms this cornbread into a very special treat, but you can also use frozen corn in winter. It also uses brown sugar, white sugar, and honey, so it’s definitely got the sweet corner covered. In fact, without the bacon, I could happily eat it for dessert.
Using a 10 inch cake pan, which is suggested, the cornbread took quite a bit longer to bake than the book says it might. About 20 minutes more, in fact. And that seems to be consistent with the results of my fellow BBA Challenge bakers. The recipe makes 2 pans full of cornbread, which is an awful lot, but it freezes well – I can vouch for that. You can find the recipe here. Anyone want to join me in a backyard, bundled up by the fire, chili and cornbread fest?
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
It’s one of those things, to each his own. I try not to use much bacon, I know it’s not the most healthy food on the table but it’s taste is divine to me.
You like sweet, I’d think this has plenty of sugar as written to qualify as sweet.
Yes, I definitely think this is a very sweet cornbread. And for the record, I really do like bacon, but I prefer it on a good BLT!
Looks great. I like traditional cornbread better but it was fun making this.
You did a wonderful job,
Susie
lol…I thought the same thing about the number of dishes I dirtied to make this cornbread. Nice job with yours, it looks lovely.
This did dirty a lot of dishes. I agree. I made it without the bacon and added finely diced jalapeno instead. Very yummy. Holiday in Aspen sounds so wonderful!!
Looks gorgeous! I thought it was tasty too. Aspen sounds fantastic.