Corny Cornbread

E wanted cornbread with his taco salad the other night so I told him that I'd make some. While he was at the gym I looked all over for the Jiffy cornbread mix but realized I was out. Ahh! I've never made cornbread from scratch before! I found a recipe that sounded good and decided to change it up a bit. It turned out so good!

Corny Cornbread

1 1/2 cups cornmeal
2 1/2 cups milk (I used 1%)
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup wheat flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
2/3 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 can whole kernel corn, drained (or 1-2 cups fresh corn---I used a mix of both)

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. In a small bowl, combine corn meal and milk; let stand for 5 minutes.

2. Meanwhile in a large bowl, whisk together flours, baking powder, salt, and sugar. Mix in the cornmeal mixture, eggs, and oil until smooth. Mix in the corn. Pour batter into prepared pan/s. I used two greased cast iron skillets. One large and one small. You could probably use a greased 13" x 9" pan or cornbread molds.

3. Bake for 25 - 35 minutes (depending on which pan you use. It only took my two skillets approx. 25 mins), or until knife inserted into the center comes out clean.

E loved it! I think it may have been a little more golden if I had poured some melted butter on top before baking; not quite sure. We've been eating the leftovers every day since I made it. I'm seriously thanking about heating some up for breakfast and slathering it with butter and maple syrup. It's THAT good!

Enjoy!

Update 8/14/09: I warmed a piece of the cornbread up, slathered it with butter, put a hot fried egg on top, and poured some real maple syrup over it all. YUM! Oh, I was in heaven. When E got home, I told him what I ate and he gagged! He thinks eggs and syrup are disgusting. I so disagree. It's so, so yummy!

Grilled Chicken and Roasted Potatoes

Okay. Who doesn't know how to grill chicken? I love grilling. E decided he wanted to try a different seasoning on the chicken. It turned out great. Basically, it's just 2 Tbsp seasoned salt, 1 Tbsp Rosemary and 1 Tbsp Thyme. Mix all three together and rub on the chicken before grilling.
I wanted to have some roasted potatoes with the meal. I just cut up a few small potatoes, sprinkled them with olive oil, salt, and pepper, and popped them in the oven until they started to brown. Very simple, but quite good.

This meal was very quick and very simple. The only part of it that took any decent amount of time was the broccoli salad. Still, it was worth it. I like to have just simple meals every now and then.

Broccoli Salad

I absolutely love this broccoli salad. It's better than anyone's I've tasted and way better than what you can get at the store. I have had some good broccoli salad, don't get me wrong, but this one has the flavors I love. I made it Sunday to go with dinner.


Broccoli Salad

1 large bunch fresh broccoli florets, cut or broken up small
1 cup raisins
1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
1 cup shredded carrots
1/4 cup chopped onion
8 crisp fried bacon - broken up

Dressing:
3/4 cup mayonnaise
1/4 cup vinegar
2 Tbsp sugar

I like to shred my own carrots and cheese. There can be some yucky stuff in the packaged ones.

I cheated with the bacon because I was in a hurry.

Place all of the ingredients from the broccoli to the bacon together in a large bowl.

Stir together the dressing ingredients in a small bowl.

Pour dressing over veggies, etc. in bowl.

Mix everything together well. Enjoy!

This already makes a large amount. I've been eating this for lunch and dinner the past couple of days and we still have a couple of days worth left. If you're having a big BBQ or party, you can easily double this recipe.

If you're daring, you can make changes to this. You can add nuts, substitute dried cranberries for the raisins, use a different type of cheese, use turkey bacon, add apples, or use different vinegars. I used white vinegar this time but have used cider vinegar and red wine vinegar. Either vinegar makes a delicious dressing, but I think cider vinegar is my favorite.

YUM!