Easy Homemade Cornbread
Written by Beth - Budget Bytes
Cornbread is a highly underrated side dish. You can whip up this deliciously sweet and moist homemade cornbread recipe with just a few pantry staples, and it makes a perfect side dish for breakfast, lunch, or dinner! Serve it slathered with butter at breakfast, crumbled into your soup or chili at lunch, or as a side with your collard greens and pork chops for dinner. It’s inexpensive, comforting, and seriously easy to make! So toss that boxed mix and let me show you how it’s done for real. ;)
Originally posted 9-5-15, updated 3-6-17
What to Serve with Cornbread
Cornbread is a great side dish to go with any thick and hearty soup, stew, or chili. The cornbread can be dipped or crumbled into the saucy stews, where it absorbs all the flavor. I love it with Slow Cooker Vegetarian Lentil Chili, Weeknight Black Bean Chili, Glazed Pork Chops, Mexican Red Lentil Stew. This cornbread recipe also goes great with eggs for breakfast!
Cornbread Add-Ins
To make your cornbread a little more fun, consider stirring in some add-ins, like cheddar cheese, roasted corn kernels, diced green chiles, chili powder, or jalapeños, blueberries, or even some cooked sausage!
What Kind of Baking Dish to Use
While this glass pie dish is my favorite dish to bake my cornbread in, you can use just about any baking dish. This amount of batter would fit well in an 8×8 casserole dish, or a 10-inch cast iron skillet (although you should preheat the skillet as the oven preheats). Glass, ceramic, and cast iron work best, but you can also use metal baking dishes.
Make Corn Muffins Instead
Yes, you can pour this batter into an oiled muffin tin, filling each well about 3/4 full. Bake at the same temperature for 16-18 minutes, or until the tops are golden brown. This recipe will make about 10 corn muffins (see step by step photos below).
Easy Homemade Cornbread Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 cup yellow cornmeal ($0.24)
- 1 cup all-purpose flour ($0.15)
- 1/4 cup sugar ($0.20)
- 4 tsp baking powder ($0.24)
- 1/2 tsp salt ($0.02)
- 1 cup milk ($0.31)
- 1 large egg ($0.27)
- 1/4 cup cooking oil ($0.08)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 425ºF and coat the inside of a 9-inch pie plate, cast iron skillet, or 8x8 casserole dish with non-stick spray (or butter for more flavor).
- In a large bowl, stir together the cornmeal, flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt until evenly combined.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together the milk, egg, and oil.
- Pour the bowl of wet ingredients into the bowl of dry ingredients and stir just until everything is moist. Avoid over stirring. It's okay if there are a few lumps.
- Pour the batter into the prepared dish and bake for about 20 minutes, or until the top and edges are golden brown. Cut into 8 pieces and serve.
Nutrition
Equipment
Scroll down for the step by step photos!
How to Make Cornbread from Scratch – Step by Step Photos
Preheat the oven to 425 degrees and coat the inside of a 9-inch pie plate or 8×8 inch casserole dish with non-stick spray. In a large bowl, stir together 1 cup yellow cornmeal, 1 cup all-purpose flour, 1/4 cup sugar, 4 tsp baking powder, and 1/2 tsp salt. Make sure these are really well stirred together.
In a separate bowl, whisk together 1 cup milk, 1 large egg, and 1/4 cup cooking oil.
Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients…
And stir just until everything is moistened. You don’t want to over stir the batter because that can develop the gluten in the flour and make the end product a little rubbery, so it’s okay if there are a few lumps. No need to stir until everything is completely smooth.
Spread the batter into your prepared dish and bake for about 20 minutes, or until the top and edges are golden brown. The exact baking time may vary slightly based on your dish and your oven.
The top will crack a little and look all delicious.
Or you can pour the batter into an oiled muffin tin, filling each well about 3/4 full. You’ll get about 10 corn muffins.
Bake the muffins at the same temperature, for 16-18 minutes, or until they’re golden brown on top.
This is such an easy recipe and it turns out wonderfully every time!!
Sorry, forgot to add the stars!
I made this tonight exactly per instructions. While the flavor was good, it was very dry…crumbled easier than I wanted. Can you suggest a fix?
You might want to invest in an oven thermometer to ensure that your oven is cooking at the right temperature. Most ovens are not. You could also add an oven-proof ramekin with water in it to your oven. It will release steam as the cornbread cooks and should help with dryness. XOXO -Monti
Thank you for this recipe! We enjoyed it! I made a very adjustment for us. I used 3 tsp. of baking powder, used bacon grease instead of oil and used Walmart brand unsweetened Almondmilk Original 30 calories. Our milk goes bad before we get it used up so we changed over to Almondmilk. You can tell it in the taste and it lasts so much longer. (use also in our cereal and milk gravy)
Thank you for the recipe. We enjoyed it! I only used 3 tsp. of baking powder and 1 cup of Walmart brand unsweetened Almondmilk Original 30 calories. Regular milk goes bad before we get it used up. Almondmilk last longer and works great in all things for us! (cereal and milk gravy)
This is the best cornbread I have ever had in my life it beats any Jiffy box or anything else I’ve ever had
Thanks for budget easy tasty recipe God bless you . NATALY.
I made cornbread recipe. It’s great. Thank you so much. I was feeling good ole homemade cornbread today. I’ll keep it and add the other items at times. 👌😀
Thanks again
Priscilla