“Good bread is the most fundamentally satisfying of all foods; and good bread with fresh butter, the greatest of feasts.” ― James Beard

I doubt James Beard grew up with bad cornbread, with or without butter. I did. Come to think of it, rarely have I had good cornbread. Mostly it is too dry. Dry like the Sahara Desert. Did you know the word Sahara means “desert” in Arabic? We’ve been saying the “Desert Desert” in all our geography courses.

The Sahara gets between zero to three inches of rain per year with some areas not receiving any moisture for years and years. The Sahara isn’t even the driest desert. That goes to the Atacama in Chile and Argentina. How dry is it? As dry as Nannie’s cornbread.

I have made it a lifelong quest to find good cornbread. I have been thwarted…mostly. Most people would have quit but being a Southern gentleman, I feel compelled to continue eating cornbread or give up my Southern gentleman’s card.

My grandmother, Nannie, made bread for every meal. Biscuits or cornbread. On those nights she made cornbread I cringed. Dry, dry, dry. How dry was her cornbread? If it had been a cow, it would have given evaporated milk. “Ba-dum…BUM” rimshot.

I can remember my grandparents crumbling up their cornbread into Their Looney Tunes jelly glasses filled with buttermilk. Sylvester the Cat did not look impressed. Any liquid, even buttermilk, adds moisture to the driest cornbread. Adding Nannie’s cornbread to buttermilk seemed to be combining two evils to make a greater evil. I like buttermilk in dishes like biscuits but have never developed a taste for it as a libation with or without crumbled cornbread in it. Okay, I’ll be sending my Southern gentleman’s card back ASAP.

With Linda’s malady many friends and family have contributed meals for which we are thankful. Many have featured cornbread to be crumbled into soup. Good thing. Good cornbread by taste but…dry. Dry cornbread goes good in soup…if the soup is good and it has been. Thankfully, no cornbread has included sugar in its recipe.

My wife, by chance, tumbled onto an alternative recipe. She made ‘close’ to good cornbread before the alternative recipe. She will tell you it is because I like my cornbread just underdone and she would take the pone out early and cut a few wedges out just to suit me before returning the cornbread to the oven to finish.

I agree with her. Truth be told, I like my biscuits slightly underdone, too.

I have memories of being allowed to eat raw biscuit dough made with lard and how many times did I lick the spoon from cake batter made with raw eggs, and unpasteurized milk? The horror! Raw lard and yet, I survived. Same with cookie dough.

So, what was the alternative recipe? The same as a regular recipe except for one ingredient…squash.

One summer we had an overabundance of squash. I gave it away to friends, family, and unsuspecting souls who drove by my garden with their car windows down. Still, I ate it every day for a month.

One of those days we had leftovers of boiled squash and onions and had earlier run out of different ways to use squash. With a mess of green beans cooking away on the stove, cornbread was an option. We pondered what we might do with the leftover squash. One of us suggested she use it in her cornbread and my quest for moist cornbread came to an end.

The cornbread was wonderful and so moist I had to eat it with a fork. With cornbread containing squash, and a mess of green beans, we had the “Three Sisters” covered and I was happy to ask for a second helping of cornbread. Summer squash is so mild it really didn’t change the taste of the cornbread.

After doing some research I feel a little akin to that lost explorer, Christopher Colombus. I discovered something that wasn’t lost. Seems like I’m not the only one looking for moist cornbread and recipes abound on various internet sites incorporating squash.

Ok, I’ll be takin’ my Southern gentleman’s card back! Truth be told, I loved Linda’s cornbread before we added squash.

Linda’s Cornbread

Ingredients

Two cups of Aunt Jemima’s self-rising cornmeal

One cup of White Lily self-rising flour (Used Red Band until it was discontinued)

Two Cups of buttermilk…maybe. Add buttermilk until you get the consistency you want along with a squirt of water.

One egg

One large tablespoon of Duke’s Mayonnaise

A dash of salt and pepper

A pinch of sugar (Optional)

Butter, Bacon grease – enough to cover the bottom of a cast iron frying pan

If using Squash, a cup of pre-cooked, drained, and chopped

Directions

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

Coat the bottom of frying pan with butter or bacon grease, or both. Yes, you can use vegetable oil if you must.

Place frying pan in the oven but don’t let butter burn.

Combine all ingredients in a mixing bowl and mix well.

Turn down oven to 350 degrees.

Remove frying pan from oven and carefully pour the mix into the pan. There should be a satisfying sizzle.

Cook for twenty to twenty-five minutes and see if it has browned enough. If not, turn it back up to 425 until it is. A toothpick inserted in the middle should come back clean.

Please give Don’s author’s page a look-see at https://www.amazon.com/stores/Don-Miller/author/B018IT38GM?ref=ap_rdr&store_ref=ap_rdr&isDramIntegrated=true&shoppingPortalEnabled=true