It seems that the difference between Southern cornbread & Northern (Yankee!) cornbread is the sugar. At least, that’s what I’ve heard. Someone correct me if I’m wrong. We don’t usually do sweet cornbread down here, although some do. My mama did not & this is the sort of cornbread I grew up on. Buttery good!
Now, I can’t claim to be an expert on cornbread, since I haven’t made it all that much, but me & the hubby love to have cornbread with soup this time of year, so I did get an iron skillet just for that reason. Iron skillets cook the best cornbread ever. My mama cooks her in an iron skillet, so it must be right.
Recently made some homemade vegetable beef soup in the new crockpot.
With cornbread on the side. Yeah, it was good! 
On New Year’s Day, I fixed the “New Year’s Luck” dish of greens, black-eyed peas & cornbread. My greens & peas sure weren’t up to my mama’s standards, but hubby liked it fine. Our local Birmingham paper ran a whole article recently on cornbread, so I found a good recipe in there & tried it. It’s definitely a good ‘un, as we say down South! Thought you might like to have a good Southern tried & true cornbread recipe for your files. This recipe called for stone-ground cornmeal, which I am going to look for. I know I sure like my stone-ground grits.
Nora’s Memaw’s Alabama Cornbread (yes, that really is the title)
Vegetable all cooking spray
1 cup white cornmeal (I used yellow, that’s what I had, but prefer white)
1/2 cup white flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tsp. sugar (just a touch, doesn’t make it sweet)
1 cup milk
1/2 cup buttermilk (I used all 1 1/2 cups buttermilk)
1 egg
1/4 cup vegetable oil (I use canola oil)
Preheat the oven to 450*. Spray a 10×16 baking dish (of course, I used the 8″ iron skillet & put about 2-3 TBS of oil in bottom, heat it in the oven as the oven is preheating, so the batter sizzles when you put it in). Combine the dry ingredients in a large bowl, whisking or stirring well to mix. In a small bowl, beat together the milk, egg & oil. Add the wet mixture to the dry, using the absolute minimum number of strokes needed to moisten dry with wet.
Transfer the batter to the prepared baking dish (or skillet!) & bake until the top of the cornbread is golden brown & springs back when touched, about 20 min. Serve hot from the pan, with butter (of course!).
You can see the only changes I made are noted in ( ). This cornbread is soft & yummy in the middle & crispy on the outside.
Good Eatin’ Y’all! 
Oh Girl! Butter me a wedge and pass it please. I love me some hot buttered cornbread. Yum!
Have a wonderful weekend.
Hugs!
Kat
(ps…I noticed in your comment to Andrea that you’re trying the Ann George Southern Mysteries. I’ve read them all. Just fun reads. They made me laugh out loud. One takes place here in Destin. I think it’s called Murder Makes Waves. I was so sad when I learned Ann George died. I was looking forward to many, many more of her books.)
Looks yummy!!
Yep Rhoda, ya can’t beat good old Southern cornbread in a black skillet! My friend Judy makes the best cornbread so I use her receipe. It’s basically like yours but I’ve never used the sugar. When it comes out of the oven, my husband wants to stand over it and eat the crispy crust before I can even turn it out on a plate! My mom says her mother used a “pinch” of suger in just about everything. My mom also uses sugar in her spagetti sauce! Your veg. soup and cornbread sounds so good I think I’ll make some Saturday (we are supposed to have snow here and I think ya’ll are too!)
Have a safe and wonderful weekend- Judy
Rhoda,
Well I came to see if that light fixture was hung yet…and instead you are making me hungry! HA!!!!
Your cornbread looks fantastic…you know I’ve thought about getting an iron skillet…and I think you just made up my mind. Yum!
Rose
Being a Yankee myself, I’ve never made cornbread. I think I’ll have to remedy that with your recipe. It looks delicious!
I’ve never made cornbread in my cast iron pan, but I DO LOVE ME SOME CO’NBREAD!! I love it both ways — with a bacon and egg breakfast, I’ll make sweetened cornbread muffins, but as the accompaniment for an evening meal, I’ll the do unsweetened, cheese-and-jalapeno-laden variety. Either way, we love it! Must try it in a pan though — it looks awesome and I bet it tastes a little different. (haha, its’ probably more authentic tasting!!)
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Hi Rhoda,
Great recipe! I’m vegan and used soy milk in place of the other milks, and it turned out great!
Thanks!
Amy
Mmmm…nothing like some good ol’ cornbread. This is almost the exact recipe that I use – except I don’t add an egg to the batter. And I don’t usually add the oil to the batter, although I have. I also use all buttermilk like you did. It keeps it much moister. Oh, and by the way, I grew up in Michigan. My family all grew up in the South, though, so I consider myself a Yankabilly instead of a Yankee. I don’t care for yellow, sweet cornbread. Bleck!
Buttermilk cornbread & butter – a staple of life. I wouldn’t know how to make cornbread in anything other than my 10″ iron skillet. Thanks for making me drool (again) Rhoda. I gotta quit reading your stuff at the office. People are starting to talk. 😛
FYI – Made 14 (yep, 14) pans of chicken & cornbread dressing this weekend; my family cannot live without it on holidays. The cornbread for the dressing must be extra dense, so I use 2 cups of buttermilk, THREE eggs & 1/2 yellow-1/2 white cornmeal to each pan of cornbread, cooked to crunchy goodness on the outside. Took 2 days, but now my freezer is full of Christmas gifts & To-Die-For party food. Wish you were closer, Rhoda, I’d bring you a pan.
Christy
P.S. Can’t wait to see ALL the Hospitality House pics to come!
Born and raised in the north with southern roots, I want to let my kids experience something other than pizza and Chinese food. I have fondest memories of visiting my great Aunt and going through her kitchen and ALWAYS seeing the iron skillet of white corn bread, the best I have ever tasted. After trying unsuccessfully for a few years to recreate it, yours looks like I might be going in the right direction. Look forward to trying with succotash, fried fish and chili for the winter months.
Nothing sweet but the TEA!
born and raised in the south my mother and made cornbread every work day. never seen or heard of cornbread with sugar in it or baked in anything other than a cast iron skillet with minimal ingredient , souther cooking was simple and easy, eggs milk and lard or bacon grease
Growing up in East Tennessee with a mom and grandmother who were masters of baking biscuits and cornbread I loved seeing this recipe using regular flour instead of self-rising flour as they both did. They did not add sugar but sometime put a strip of bacon in the skillet and fried it leaving the hot grease and bacon in the skillet. They poured the batter over the sizzling bacon and bacon great and then poured half the batter on one side and half on the other side of the skillet. When the delicious crispy pone came out of the pan one half was folded back on the other and served immediately with a lot of butter. Then my dad’s favorite “desert” was a cornbread crumbled in a dish of buttermilk. Thanks for jogging some great memories!
Jane
Thank you for sharing this recipe!! This is spot on Southern Cornbread Chicken&Dressing!! Delicious! Perfect!