Cornbread From Scratch AND Cornbread Dressing - Two Recipes For The Price Of One

AND

Hello friends!  It's a good day, no - it's a great day, when  you get two for the price of one.  At least I think it is.  Sometimes I make one recipe knowing there will be a great use for it in another recipe.  Like here.  Delicious cornbread made from scratch and leftovers used to make a fabulous cornbread dressing!  Oh yes, two of my all time favorites.

I am going to show you how to make cornbread like my Kentucky grandma did and how to make cornbread dressing like a true southerner.   Oh boy, oh boy, are they both fantastic!  We enjoyed cornbread with fried catfish two nights ago and tonight we had the world famous roast beef and dressing.  What?  Did I say roast beef and dressing?  I sure did!  Most of us think of dressing with turkey or chicken.  You mean you can have it with roast beef?  You can and absolutely should!  

This combination comes from my first job.  I started working at Mead Johnson and Company in Evansville, Indiana, the week after I graduated high school in 1966.  I worked in the Medical Research Department.  There was an employee cafeteria that served wonderful food for super reasonable prices.  I mean real home cooked food.  On Thursday, once a month they served roast beef and dressing.  The cafeteria was always absolutely packed on that day and you knew you had to wait in line for a while, but is was so worth the wait.  I don't know about you, but my mom always made dressing with poultry, we never had it with beef.  This is where I learned that not only could you have it with beef, it was one of the best things ever!

Let me walk you through how to make cornbread in a cast iron skillet - a true southern treat.  Don't get me wrong, I like Jiffy cornbread and I use it a lot, but it doesn't even compare with REAL cornbread.  Kentucky cornbread.  Southern cornbread.  The most important part is a cast iron skillet, corn muffin, or corn stick baking pan.  Yes, they come in cast iron.  It's vitally important for that fabulously crispy, crunchy crust on the outside.  No other baking pan will make your cornbread turn out this way.  Seriously.

I have a 10 inch cast iron skillet that I use to bake my biscuits and cornbread in.  Once you do it this way, you will understand why.  Example - do you like Cracker Barrel cornbread?  It's because they bake it in cast iron.  It is soooooo yummy.  Now, here is a BIG secret to good cornbread.  The oil that you use in the batter should be heated in the cast iron skillet, swirled around the skillet then poured into the batter.  This keeps the bread from sticking to the pan and makes for a better cornbread.  Why?  I don't really know, but it does and it is the way grandma and mom always did it.  So, I do it too.  

Here is what you need for the cornbread

1 1/2 cups self rising cornmeal mix  (that means it already has the baking powder and salt in it, so you don't have to add it)  If you can't find self rising cornmeal mix, look on line to find out how to make it.

2 large eggs

1 cup buttermilk (add 1 tsp white vinegar or lemon juice to whole milk if you don't have buttermilk on hand and let sit for 5 minutes)

2 large eggs

1/4 cup vegetable oil

1 cup all purpose flour

*1/4 cup sugar  (we NEVER add sugar to our cornbread, feel free if you like it sweet)

Heat your oven to 450 degrees F.  

Beat the eggs in a medium bowl and stir in the buttermilk, corn meal mix, flour (and sugar) until smooth.  Heat the oil in the pan (I do this in the oven for about a minute), swirl it around the pan and add it to the batter.  REMEMBER, HANDLE WILL BE HOT ON CAST IRON - USE A HOT PAD!!!!!

Mix the batter until smooth.  It should be pourable, not too thick.  If it seems too thick, add 1 to 2 tablespoons more milk.  Pour into prepared pan. 

Bake 20 - 25 minutes or until golden brown.  

See, the batter is thick but pourable, like a brownie batter.   After you remove the baked cornbread from the oven, let the pan sit for a few minutes, get a plate and flip the pan over so the cornbread  can be cut and the beautiful crusty bottom becomes the top.  This is how it looks.

Oh my goodness, it is so good.  Eat it hot with a big slab of butter melted on it, or you could do it like my grandma always did for a night snack.  Crumble cold cornbread up in a glass of milk or buttermilk and eat it with a spoon.  Several of our family members had relatives who did the same.  Did anyone in your family do this?  Have I done it?  No.  Thanks.  It might be delicious, but I can't stand anything floating in my milk other than cereal.  Feel free to try it if you want.  Let me know what you think.

Dan and I enjoyed this wonderful cornbread with our fried catfish the other night.  Another reason for making the cornbread from scratch was so I could make dressing to go with our roast beef tonight.  Two birds with one cornbread.  Love it!  

If you like stove top stuffing, you are going to love this recipe!  It is super wonderful and so flavorful.  It's really easy to make if you already have the cornbread made and you want it to be a day or two old.  The dressing just works better with older bread, it doesn't get as soggy.

Here is how to make cornbread stuffing our family's way.

4-5 cups crumbled cornbread

3 slices bread, lightly toasted and crumbled

1 cup diced onions

1 cup diced celery

1/2 stick butter

1 tsp salt

fresh cracked black pepper

1 Tbsp ground sage

1 tsp dried thyme

1/2 tsp dried rosemary

2 large eggs, beaten

3 cups beef stock (from a box or can), or a little more if needed.

Dice onions and celery.  Melt butter in a skillet and add onions and celery.  Cook until onions start to get clear - do not brown!  You want them to be crunchy in the dressing.

Crumble cornbread and bread in a large bowl.  Add 1 tsp salt and lots of fresh cracked black pepper. 

Remove onions and celery from the stove and add to bread crumbs.  Add salt, pepper, and spices.  Mix thoroughly!!!!  Add beef stock, mix thoroughly.  Taste before adding eggs.  Add anything you think needed now.  (I like lots of sage, you may only want to use 2 tsps ground sage if you are not a fan.)  Beat eggs with a fork in a bowl, add to bread mixture.  Mix thoroughly!  If the dressing seems dry, add a bit more beef stock.  You want it very moist before baking.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Spray a 9 x 13 pan with cooking spray.  Put all the dressing mixture in the pan and bake for 30 minutes or until golden brown.  Remove from oven and serve.

Look at all the bright green celery and onions everywhere.  Yummmmmmmmo!  I like the vegetables to have a bit of crunch to them instead of being soggy.  That's why it is important not to overcook them in the skillet.  This reheats beautifully in the microwave in case you don't eat it all .  

Oh such succulent roast beef laying over that savory dressing.  I have to tell you, it was a wonderful meal!  Wish you could have joined us.  The really exciting part is, we have left overs for tomorrow.  I LOVE when that happens.  Give these recipes a try.  You are going to be cooking like a southerner in no time!

Everyday Donna

Things to Remember:

I remember as a kid being cold a lot, and hungry sometimes. We'd go to bed with just cornbread and milk, and I remember wearing shoes with holes in the bottom. I remember having twine for shoestrings.

~ Buck Owens

Shepherd's Pie - Quick, Easy, Delicious

Well, it's a new year and I am having a hard time getting back in the routine of things.  Sunday evening we came home after a busy day and I wanted comfort food.  You know, something with mashed potatoes - real mashed potatoes.  I never, ever make instant mashed potatoes at home.  Ever.  Why?  Because there is nothing like real mashed potatoes, I don't care how you doctor them up.  They are easy to make and there is a distinct difference between instant and mashed potatoes made from scratch.  As a potato connoisseur, I can tell the difference.  A friend argued with me once that I could not tell the difference, but I can.  It is just worth the extra effort to make mashed potatoes.  In my book, there is nothing quite as good.  

My first thought was to make a meat loaf, but I knew it would take way too long.  We were hungry and didn't want to wait several more hours to eat.  My next thought?  Shepherd's Pie.  Yummm.  One of our favorites and it's relatively quick and easy.   The beauty of Sheperd's Pie is that it combines your protein, starch and vegetable into one easy dish and has so much flavor.  It is also easy to reheat for leftovers.

I did a little research on Shepherd's Pie to find out why it has that name - mostly out of curiosity.  (I do that a lot)  I found that Shepherd's Pie was originally made from leftover meat (lamb) thus the name Shepherd's Pie since shepherds herd sheep.  When beef was used, it was called Cottage Pie.  The term Cottage Pie was first recorded in 1791 and Shepherd's Pie in 1877.  Now, we just call it all Shepherd's Pie. Whatever it's called, it's delicious.

Here is what you will need.  (This makes a 9 x 13 casserole full, but you can easily halve this for a smaller portion.)    Preheat oven to 350.


Ingredients:

2 pounds ground beef (lamb, or turkey)
1 medium onion, chopped
1 medium garlic clove, minced
1/4 tsp. dried rosemary
1/4 tsp dried thyme
salt and pepper to taste
3/4 cup frozen green peas

4 cups mashed potatoes (use instant if you want to)  I make my mashed potatoes first, so they are ready to put on the casserole when the meat is finished cooking.

8 ounces cheddar cheese, grated (grate my own because I like the way it melts and it's cheaper)

Directions

Brown ground beef in large pan.  Just as beef is almost done, add onion and garlic and cook until onion is translucent. Drain any fat.   Add rosemary, thyme, salt and pepper to taste.  Add green peas and mix thoroughly.  Place in 9 x 13 casserole dish.

Cover with mashed potatoes. Spread with back of spoon to evenly cover all of ground beef,

Next, cover with grated cheddar cheese and place in 350 degree oven until the cheese has melted.

Let the casserole sit for a few minutes and serve in bowls or on dinner plates.  This can also be made in individual serving ramekins if you prefer.  There is a restaurant in our neighborhood that has "Pie and a Pint" night and they make theirs in pie plates.  Do whatever suits your fancy.

This dish is so good with the sweetness of the green peas, and the creaminess of the mashed potatoes covered with melted cheese mixed with all the deliciously flavored meat.  Yum, yum, yum.  If you have picky eaters in your house (like our grandsons can be), give this dish a try.  It is filling and there are no scary ingredients in it that can make a dish "suspect" to little boys.  You know, things like MUSHROOMS.  This is comfort food at it's finest.  You can also make it ahead, keep it in the refrigerator and reheat when ready to serve.  Just wait and place the cheese on the potatoes when you place it in the oven to reheat.  We enjoyed ours with a spinach salad and hot crescent rolls.  Let me say, it truly hit the spot.  Comfort food desire fulfilled.

Give this casserole a try.  My three favorite words describe it - quick, easy, delicious. I think it will become a "go to" dish for you just like in our house.  Enjoy.

Everyday Donna

Things to Remember:

In the New Year, may your right hand always be stretched out in friendship, but never in want.    Irish Toast

Roasted Root Vegetables are Delicious!

I am a vegetable loving gal.  I eat a little meat, but side dishes are my preference.  This lovely dish of roasted winter vegetables was served for Thanksgiving and it was delicious!!  Our son in love Todd made the turkey and stuffing and I baked a ham, made all the sides and deserts.  Needless to say, we had a true Thanksgiving feast.  This was probably my favorite dish on the buffet of 15 sides and deserts I prepared.  

This is an easy recipe and you can choose any of your favorite vegetables to roast.  The hardest part is cutting them all up, the roasting part is easy.  Here is what I used:

Turnips

Butternut Squash

Brussels Sprouts

Baby Bella Mushrooms

Zucchini

Onions

You will also need a few cloves of garlic, olive oil, salt, pepper and a few big sprigs of rosemary.  You will also need a large baking sheet with sides.

Cut all the vegetables into similar sized pieces so that they will cook at about the same time.  Cut the Brussels sprouts in half and the onions in half and then into eighths.   Spray the baking sheet lightly with cooking spray.  Places all the vegetables in a bowl and drizzle with olive oil, salt and pepper and mix with your hands making sure all vegetables are coated.  Place the coated vegetables on the baking sheet.  Place several unpeeled cloves of garlic on the vegetables in various places and lay two large sprigs of rosemary on the top of the vegetables.  It should look like this.  The garlic and rosemary just lightly perfume the vegetables and give them a wonderful flavor.

Lightly drizzle some more olive oil over the top and put in the oven at 350 degrees until vegetables are soft.  It took about 30 minutes. 

Roasting brings out the sweetness in the vegetables and they reheat beautifully if they are not all consumed at one meal.  I would have used some beets also, but I could not find any.  Beets are best pickled or roasted.  You can use as many vegetables in any amount you want to make this dish.  Needless to say, I made a huge amount for all the people we were serving.  Either way, they are so very good to eat!

I hope you will try this easy and delicious method of making roasted vegetables.  It is a true winter delight.  Enjoy!

Everyday Donna

Things to Remember:

An onion can make people cry, but there has never been a vegetable invented to make them laugh.  ~Will Rogers

Bountiful Fall Harvest

The Nashville Farmer's Market is where we do the bulk of our food shopping these days.  Why?  First, we support local growers and appreciate their effort and the quality of food they provide us.  We want to know that will continue, so we give them our money in exchange for their excellent products.  Secondly, it is always an adventure.  There is always something new to see or explore.  Third, it means there will be some recipe forthcoming to make our dining experience worth the effort.

I thought I would show you some of the fall products available at the market right now and then share a recipe I made using butternut squash.  Did I take a picture of the butternut squash or the stand where I purchased it?  No, I forgot.  Silly me.  But, I did capture the beauty of the fall mums and pumpkins.  You can even see the state capital in the corner of one picture.  The Farmer's Market is not far from downtown.  It is quite large, has a wonderful variety of fresh produce and locally grown meat - beef, pork, chicken and lamb which is grass fed and hormone and antibiotic free.   There is  also a food court offering a wide variety of international cuisines.  The Jamaican restaurant, Jamaican Way, has been featured on Diner's, Drive Ins and Dives on the Food Network.  It's worth a trip just to enjoy some of the food.  There is also a large Indian market that offers a huge variety of spices and products.  And, there is a really nice nursery offering all sort of flowers, shrubs and lawn decorations.  I can spend a lot of time checking out all the beautiful flowers and I usually come home with something lovely.

Here are just some of the fall pumpkins available.  It is so hard to pick out just a couple to bring home when they are all so beautiful and interesting.

I love the way the sunlight plays on the pumpkins in these pictures.

If you look to the center of this picture, you can see the Tennessee state capital sitting grandly upon the hill.  It is quite a distance from the Farmer's Market but looks lovely on this sunny day.

This poor pumpkin looks like he needs to see the dermatologist.  There are so many interesting varieties of pumpkins and gourds - some quite beautiful, others quite prehistoric looking.  Isn't nature amazing?

Don't you love the leaning towers of pumpkins?  How cute would these be decorated on your front porch?  Or, you could just stack them like this.  They are so interesting and varied.  I could spend hours  looking at all the varieties.

Hope you enjoyed the pictures from the Farmer's Market.  Just thought I'd share them with you.  We had a lovely afternoon there with our "besties" while they were visiting.

My BFF Tonya loves butternut squash, so I purchased some while we were at the market.  I will tell you it is NOT easy to peel, but hopefully this will help you.  Butternut squash has a very hard "shell" like pumpkin.  It can be split and baked, but it had to be peeled for this recipe.  Hopefully, this will make it a little easier for you.  Using a chef's knife, I cut off the top and bottom ends.  The squash has a thick neck and a round bottom with a definite separation between the two.  Cut between the neck and the round bottom.  Next, peel the neck with a sharp knife or heavy-duty vegetable peeler, then peel the round bottom.  Cut the bottom in half and remove the seeds and pith.  Cut the neck in half.  Lay the cut sides down and cut long strips and then cut crosswise so that you have about 1 to 2 inches squares.  Do the same the with round bottom pieces.

Spray a casserole dish with cooking spray.  I used two squash for this recipe to serve 8 to 10 people.  Lightly salt and pepper the squash and place it in the casserole dish.  Drizzle with extra virgin olive oil, then drizzle with honey.  I used about two handsful of brown sugar and crumbled it over the squash.  Next, I took about 3 big sprigs of fresh rosemary and stripped the needles from the stems and minced it.  Sprinkle the rosemary over the squash.  You can used dried rosemary if you do not have fresh. ( Let me say, I am going to miss my herb garden terribly this winter.  I think I may have to put some of my favorite herbs in pots and keep them in a sunny window in our sun room.)   Place the casserole in the oven at 350 and cook until the squash is soft.  It is really delicious and makes a wonderful fall side dish.  Next time, I am going to try this same recipe with sweet potatoes because I think it would be just as good and sweet potatoes are a whole lot easier to peel!

Hope you enjoyed the pictures and that you will try this really delicious recipe now that the days are cooler and there are definite signs that winter is on the way.  I will miss all the summer and fall beauty of the farmer's market and all the fabulous summer produce, but we will continue to shop there all through the winter trying whatever local things are available.  Am I looking forward to cold weather?  Not at all!  But, it's part of living isn't it?  Now, it's time to start sewing on all those Halloween costumes I have to make.  Catch you later.

Everyday Donna

Things to Remember:

“Living up to an image that you have of yourself or that other people have of you is inauthentic living.”
― Eckhart Tolle,

Pasta e Fagioli Recipe

This is the outdoor dining patio of a restaurant in Chicago called Piccolo Sogno where we ate earlier in the summer while visiting our son and his family.  Not only was it beautiful, they served some of the best Italian food I have ever eaten.  They make their own prosciutto, and their menu is rustic Italian food.  The name Piccolo Sogno in Italian translates to "little dream" and their website said this restaurant is the dream of it's owners.  It is truly a beautiful place with wonderful food if you ever have a chance to eat there!  

Actually, this picture has nothing to do with pasta e fagioli except that it is a picture of an Italian restaurant.  My picture of the soup I made was not usable because it was so blurry.  Boo!  So I used the next best thing which was this beautiful picture with a beautiful memory attached -  just like this soup will hopefully make a lasting memory for you and become a recipe you will want to use over and over.

Last week, a Facebook friend messaged me and asked if I had a recipe for Pasta e Fagioli because they love to eat it at Olive Garden and she was wanting to make some.  I had to tell her that I did not have a recipe.  But, I looked some up for her and found one from Giada DeLaurentis that sounded wonderful.  It piqued my interest and I decided to try it and I added my own little spin to it.  You can find her original recipe at Foodnetwork.com if you want to it.  This is a truly delicious, hearty and filling soup and I think you will really like it.  It is also an easy recipe and relatively inexpensive to make.  Here is the recipe I came up with (which I doubled) sans picture.   I'll try to do better next time.

Ingredients

• 4 sprigs fresh thyme
• 1 large sprig fresh rosemary, minced  (if you do not have fresh herbs, substitute dried herbs)
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 cup chopped onion
• 1 lb mild Italian sausage
• 2 teaspoons minced garlic
• 5 3/4 cups low-sodium chicken broth
• 2 (14.5-ounce) cans red kidney beans, drained and rinsed
• 1 14.5 ounce can diced tomatoes
• 3/4 cup elbow macaroni
• Freshly ground black pepper
• Pinch red pepper flakes, optional

Remove casings from sausages and brown in large soup pot or dutch oven, breaking them up into bite sized pieces while they brown.  While sausage is browning, dice onion and garlic.  Add onion and garlic to sausage when it is almost done cooking.  Cook until onions are transparent.  Drain and rinse beans.  Add beans to sausage, onions and garlic, add chicken broth, tomatoes,  chopped thyme, rosemary, red pepper flakes and black pepper.   Simmer for about 30 minutes.  Add macaroni and cook just until al dente - about 8 minutes.   If soup seems too thick, add some water and let it heat through.  Remove bay leaf before serving.  Serve with fresh grated parmesan cheese.  Oh my goodness delicious!

We had this soup on a cool night with salad and warm garlicky bread sticks and it was Deee - licious!  Give it a try.  It's  quick, easy, satisfying and makes wonderful left overs! We will be having this again and again.   Enjoy!!

Everyday Donna


Things to Remember:

Do more of what makes you happy!