Homemade cornbread

I recently published a spread about the Francis Mill, a 121-year-old grist meal in Haywood County. The owner, Tanna Timbes, was kind enough to give me some of the corn meal produced by the mill itself.  Granted, the mill doesn't make corn meal for commercial uses, but she happened to have a bag of it in her refrigerator and gave it to me to make homemade cornbread.

You'll have to excuse the lack of pictures -- my camera is currently on the fritz. Hopefully my mad describing skills will be enough.

On the bag of corn meal, Tanna had a recipe for Miss Ella's Cornbread. I believe Miss Ella was her grandmother.

At any rate, here it is:

Miss Ella's Cornbread

2-1/2 cups corn meal

3 teaspoons baking powder

3/4 teaspoons baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 egg, slightly beaten

1-1/4 cup milk or buttermilk

The recipe says to place bacon drippings or shortening in a baking pan and place it in a 425-degree oven. I'll be honest, I didn't do this part because I had neither.  Instead, I sprayed my pan with cooking spray. 

Combine the dry ingredients together and stir.  Then add the other ingredients. Add enough milk to make a good pouring consistency.  I ended up adding a little over 1-1/2 cups of regular milk, although I'm curious to know how buttermilk would taste...

Pour the batter into your baking pan and bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until the crust is golden brown.

I ended up taking the cornbread out a little early -- I have a thing against dry cornbread and could tell the bread was starting to split.  

I noticed bright orange flecks in the bread, which I'm assuming is the corn meal. I'm not used to all this homemade stuff -- I usually get the mix that says "just add water."  At any rate, it came out nice and fluffy, but crumbled a bit.  

My friend was kind enough to take a picture for me, which I don't currently have, but a picture is available in this week's copy of The Guide. Even if I had my own, the bread was too crumbly to look pretty on a plate, so I wouldn't have taken a picture of it anyway.

At any rate, hope you enjoy it.  Don't forget about the Music at the Mill event this Saturday!! Tours and demonstrations will be given, along with music and barbecue.  Should be a great event!