Thanksgiving flavours: BROWN BUTTER CORNBREAD w HONEY BUTTER

Moist, sweet brown butter cornbread with a honey butter. This is what dreams are made of!

Welcome back, heres a sweet one for Issue #14 of Unfiltered Flavours! Not to be dramatic, but this cornbread recipe will change your life!

The BEST cornbread.

Keeping on theme for Thanksgiving, it was only right I shared my cornbread recipe. This is the exact recipe I use at my Supperclubs and I swear by it. Cornbread is a bit of a tricky one, because you cant please everyone. I’ve always loved sweet cornbread, but a good chunk of the world dont. It’s genuinely down to preference and the great thing about this recipe is that you can easily use less sugar, the texture wont be impacted. If you prefer having a savoury cornbread then I would skip on the vanilla , nutmeg and add a little more salt!

Cornmeal is what you’ll need for cornbread, you can pick this up in Sainsburys depending on where you live. If you can’t get it in a supermarket or any market then you could also just order it online. I like to use coarse cornmeal, I think it has a better bite and gives me the texture that I know and love with cornbread. It’s not supposed to be like a sponge cake, it’s meant to be denser, moist but still light. For me, a good cornbread needs have more cornmeal then it does flour. The coarse cornmeal contributes to a more denser texture. Don’t get it twisted though, when I say dense it doesn’t mean its going to stick to the roof of your mouth!

A good cornbread needs a coarse cornmeal.

I also use creamed corn, which is quite controversial but its how I grew up having it. You can get from an any East Asian supermarket and it will set you back pennies. When I was little my family never used to blend the corn and I’ll be honest I don’t want chunks of corn in my cornbread! So I blend the creamed corn, because we want the corn flavour but don’t want the chunks. Apart from that, there’s no specialist ingredients that you’ll require. Just make sure you’re using good quality stuff. 

I swear by this creamed corn brand.

Lastly, I like to use a mix of oil and butter. Oil contributes towards a better crumb and moistness. Whilst butter provides a really good taste. If you truly want the best cornbread, you need get yourself a deep cast iron baking dish, the crust this creates is unbeatable!

A 9 X 13 cast iron really works like magic for this.

Ingredients

80g unsalted brown butter

335g cornmeal (coarse) 

280g plain flour  (all purpose)

125g sugar

Pinch of nutmeg 

2 tbsp baking powder 

1/2 tbsp salt 

375g creamed corn 

550ml whole milk 

2 large eggs 

125ml oil 

1 tsp vanilla bean paste

30g unsalted butter

Honey butter: 

115 salted butter 

130g honey method

Method:

1. Preheat your oven to 190°c along with your baking dish. Then in a pot you want to add your unsalted butter, make sure its diced in medium size cubes. Brown your butter on a medium heat for a few minutes or until you see specks of brown solids.

   

   This is what your browned butter should look like. Really keep an eye on it because it can go from bubbling to brown VERY quickly.

2. Now combine cornmeal, flour, sugar, nutmeg, baking powder and salt. Give it a whisk and pop to the side

3. Then combine your blended creamed corned, milk, eggs, oil and vanilla bean paste. Give that a good whisk. Then make a well in your dry ingredients for the wet mixture and browned butter.

4. Pour the browned butter into the well along with half of your wet mix. Mix and gradually add in the remaining wet ingredients. You only need to whisk this for a maximum of 2 minutes. You just want to ensure there are no lumps of flour, some tiny lumps will be visible and that’s okay.

   

   This is the texture you’re looking for.

5. Now remove your baking dish from the oven and add your butter. Be sure to move it around and coat the base. Place back into the oven for a minute, then add your cornbread batter.

6. Bake in the oven for 35-40 mins or until a toothpick comes out mostly clean from poking in the middle. You dont want it to be bone dry!

7. Whilst your cornbread is baking, add your butter and honey to a small sauce pot. Allow this to melt on medium heat and whisk to bring it together. You don’t want this mixture to boil or even get super hot.Once it’s melted you can remove this from the heat and continue to whisk. Butter and honey naturally don’t mix, by whisking you bring this together.  

8. After 30 mins of your cornbread baking, brush with the honey butter and be sure to get the edges. Then let it bake for 5 more minutes or until its done.

9. Let your cornbread cool for 10 minutes before slicing.

   

   Your finished cornbread should look like this!