As if cornbread wasn’t delicious enough on its own, I went ahead and stirred in a pile of shredded cheddar cheese and chopped jalapeño. Because why not? And since this Jalapeño Cheddar Cornbread is on the spicy side, I decided to go with a richer cornbread batter that includes sour cream and an extra egg to kind of balance the heat. The result is rich, cheesy, moist, and ✨spicy✨.
How Spicy Is This Cornbread?
It’s pretty spicy. Despite scraping the seeds out of the jalapeño that is mixed into the batter, the heat still seems to permeate the cornbread pretty well. If you’re not into heat, you can certainly just make this a plain cheddar cornbread or stir in some mild diced green chiles in place of the jalapeño.
What Kind of Baking Dish Should I Usse?
I used a ceramic baking dish, but I’ve also tested the recipe using a glass baking dish, and they both worked great. An 8×8-inch square dish is probably the best size. You could also bake this in a 10-inch cast iron skillet, although you may want to preheat it just a bit before adding the batter.
Can I Make Them Jalapeño Cheddar Cornbread Muffins?
Yes, just divide the batter equally between about ten wells of a muffin tin and bake at the same temperature. Because the muffins are smaller and have more surface area exposed to the heat, the baking time will be shorter. Just keep an eye on the muffins starting at about 20 minutes, and let them continue to bake until puffed in the center and golden brown around the edges.
How to Store Jalapeño Cheddar Cornbread
Allow the cornbread to cool completely to room temperature and then store in an air-tight container in the refrigerator for up to 4-5 days. Or, you can wrap it tightly in plastic, place it in a freezer bag, and freeze it for a few months. To thaw, simply let the cornbread sit at room temperature for about 15 minutes, or microwave for 30 seconds or so.
Don’t forget to make a pot of homemade chili to go with your cornbread! :)
Jalapeño Cheddar Cornbread
Servings 9 piecesIngredients
- 1 tsp butter ($0.04)
- 1 cup all-purpose flour ($0.15)
- 1 cup cornmeal ($0.38)
- 2 Tbsp sugar ($0.04)
- 1 Tbsp baking powder ($0.06)
- 3/4 tsp salt ($0.02)
- 4 oz. cheddar, shredded ($1.00)
- 2 jalapeños ($0.14)
- 1/2 cup sour cream ($0.58)
- 1/2 cup milk ($0.20)
- 2 large eggs ($0.42)
- 1/4 cup cooking oil ($0.16)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400ºF. Use the butter to grease the inside of an 8×8 inch baking dish.
- In a large bowl, combine the flour, cornmeal sugar, baking powder, and salt.
- Remove the seeds from one of the jalapeños and finely dice it, then slice the second jalapeño into rounds. Add the diced jalapeño to the bowl with the flour, saving the sliced jalapeño to use as a topping.
- Add about ¾ of the shredded cheddar to the bowl with the flour mixture, saving the remaining to use as a topping. Stir the diced jalapeño and shredded cheddar into the flour mixture until evenly combined.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together the sour cream, milk, eggs, and oil.
- Pour the wet ingredients into the bowl with the dry ingredients and stir just until everything is moist (it's okay if there are a few lumps).
- Pour the batter into the prepared baking dish and spread it out evenly. Top with the sliced jalapeños and the remaining shredded cheddar.
- Bake the cornbread for about 35 minutes, or until the center has puffed up and the edges are golden brown.
- Slice the cornbread into nine squares and serve warm.
See how we calculate recipe costs here.
Nutrition
Love cornbread? Try these other cornbread flavors: Sweet Potato Cornbread, Lemon Blueberry Cornbread Skillet, Easy Homemade Cornbread (classic cornbread), or Hatch Chile Sweet Potato Cornbread.
How to Make Jalapeño Cheddar Cornbread – Step by Step Photos
Preheat the oven to 400ºF and use about 1 tsp butter to grease the inside of an 8×8-inch baking dish. In a large bowl, combine 1 cup cornmeal, 1 cup all-purpose flour, 2 Tbsp sugar, 3 tsp baking powder, and ¾ tsp salt.
Remove the seeds from one jalapeño and then finely dice the pepper. Slice the second jalapeño into rounds. The diced jalapeño will go into the batter and the rounds will be used as a topping.
Add the diced jalapeño and most of your 4oz. shredded cheddar cheese to the bowl with the dry ingredients (save about ¼ of the cheese to use as a topping). Stir the jalapeño and cheddar into the flour mixture.
In a separate bowl, whisk together ½ cup milk, 2 large eggs, 1/2 cup sour cream, and ¼ cup cooking oil.
Pour the bowl of wet ingredients into the bowl of dry ingredients.
Stir until everything is moist. Avoid over stirring. It’s okay if it’s a little lumpy.
Spread the cornbread batter into an 8×8-inch baking dish, then top with the sliced jalapeños. Finish by topping with the remaining shredded cheddar cheese.
Bake the cornbread in the preheated 400ºF oven for about 35 minutes or until the center is puffed and it’s golden brown around the edges.
Slice the cornbread into nine pieces and serve warm with your favorite soup or chili!!
I make this every time I make chilli and it’s become one of my partner’s favourite side dishes. Such a great and easy recipe. Easily adjusted for the cast iron pan. Thanks for a great recipe!!
I’ve made this made times and it’s always so good! Thanks for sharing!
One question though: Could I use butter instead of oil? My significant other hates oil for whatever reason..
Many** I made this many times …
It will change the texture slightly, but it’s still great. We actually have another cornbread recipe coming out soon that uses butter instead of oil. ;)
I’ve tried several recipes from this website. Loved everyone of them, and this is my favorite. I actually burned the top of the it, but it still tasted so good. Thank you so much for sharing the recipe.
BTW, I substituted grits for cornmeal and I loved the course texture of it
That’s interesting, as I never thought to do that. I will have to try that one day. Please share your recipe.
Used pickled jalapenos because that’s what I had in the pantry but this is so good!
So very good! This is a great variation to standard cornbread.
I made this to go along with some soup I was making, and it was TERRIBLE!!! Extremely dry, and no flavor whatsoever! Also, the list of ingredients call for one measurement of baking powder, while the instructions say something different. So annoyed that I wasted all my ingredients on this recipe! :(
Hi Nadia, one tablespoon is equal to three teaspoons, so it is the same measurement. I’m sorry you did not enjoy the cornbread.
This cornbread is soooooo delicious. It was the perfect side to my white chicken chili. You can bet I’ll be making this cornbread recipe from now on. Thanks, Beth.
Hi
Can I use over the counter 😊 box cornbread mix for this recipe
I would need to test it to see which of the other ingredients needed to be adjusted when using a boxed mix. That being said, you could try just making the box mix as directed on the package and stirring in cheddar and chopped jalapeños. :)
I just made this recipe to have with the chili I’d also made.Turned out great. I did make a few changes to account for things I did not have on hand. Specifically: I had no sour cream so I used buttermilk (I keep frozen buttermilk on hand as is described in another budget bytes post) and I did not have fresh jalepenos so I used pickled jalepenos. Another winner recipe.
I’m not sure if I did something incorrectly, but mine came out pretty dry. Whenever a recipe has flour by volume instead of weight, I make sure to spoon it into my measuring cup to make sure I get the right amount, but it still seemed like my batter and then the bread itself was too dry. It was tasty to dip into the salsa soup recipe you posted recently though!
Hi, when you say “4 oz. of cheddar, shredded,” do you mean a 4 oz. block of cheddar, which you then shred? Or 4 oz. of shredded cheddar? I assume the former, but I just wanted to make sure, because the wording in the step by step directions implies the second. Thank you! This looks amazing :)
You can use either pre-shredded or block cheese that you shred yourself, four ounces for either one. Cheese is a solid so when you see the ounce measurement on the package that is in weight, not volume. Only liquids are measured in volume ounces. I hope that helps!
Thank you! I just wanted to check, because some of your recipes call for cheese by volume. That makes sense, though
Great recipe! Made it gluten free by substituting the flour for 1/3 cup sorghum flour, 1/3 cup brown rice flour, 1/3 cup tapioca starch and 1/2 tsp xanthan gum. It came out fluffy and delicious. Will definitely make again, thank you!
Made this two days ago and it was delicious. It was my Japanese husband’s first experience with cornbread and he absolutely loved it, especially when I taught him to add honey just before eating. We had small squares for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and breakfast again because he wanted to savor it. We don’t have a regular oven, but I cooked it in the toaster oven and it came out fine. Finding sour cream in Tokyo wasn’t easy, but I made it happen (though I will substitute Greek yogurt next time just for simplicity’s sake), and I could only find canned jalapenos (I’ve never seen a fresh one in Japan), but this recipe proved to be a big hit in this little corner of Tokyo. Thank you!
Mmmm, yum! I love the spicy-sweet combo of adding honey!
This was great! I had a ton of extra corn from my CSA and snuck 2 ears of cooked corn into this cornbread, it worked great!
Can I scale down on baking powder? I find such a big amount overpowering every other taste.
Sure. It may make the bread a little more dense, but I think it would still be tasty.
I cut down baking powder to 1 tsp and just in case, whipped the egg whites to stiff peaks and added them last. The cornbread turned out good, fluffy enough for me. A bit on the dry side but that’s because I let it sit too long in the oven.