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. ;)
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
Servings 8Ingredients
- 1 cup yellow cornmeal ($0.24)
- 1 cup all-purpose flour ($0.15)
- 1/4 cup sugar ($0.20)
- 1 Tbsp 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 8×8 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.
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Equipment
Nutrition
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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, 1 Tbsp 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.
Hi all, I made this last night, however , being from large family and cooking for large sons, I doubled the recipe ! The cornbread came out terrific like a cake in my skillet . Definitely, would rate 5 stars .
I don’t know if you received my question. Can you triple the recipe and bake it in a 9×13 pan?
You definitely could do a 9×13 pan. I’d advise against the bundt.
Question. Can you triple and bake in a bundt pan?
You could certainly try!
Agree, this tasted like cardboard. Granted I did forget the sugar but still. Also, the recipe instructions call for 20 mins at 425, but the video shows 325 so that’s super confusing 😕
Yes, the recipe & video have different oven temperatures. Is the oven temperature to be 425 or 375 degrees?
Sorry, the typo is in the video. The correct temperature is 425. I’ll remove the video until we can get it remade! Thanks!
Hi , I am from Egypt & I wanted to share with you how we eat our corn bread . Actually we eat it with a cup of tea. Sometimes during breakfast we add little bit of jam on top & it’s delicious!
Just what I want from cornbread — super easy to throw together with ingredients I have on hand, and the finished bread is fluffy with just a hint of sweetness. I followed the recipe exactly and was very happy with results. Frequently I have to adjust bake time but my oven must be on the same wavelength as Beth’s because the recommended temp/time was just perfect. We’ll definitely make this every time we make chili.
We really enjoyed this cornbread with our out of the freezer chili. I don’t bake much, but I found this super easy. I used oat milk because my wife can’t eat dairy. I might use more corn meal and less flour next time.
Had real cornbread for first time in the States a few months ago. I heard the secret to good cornbread is popcorn.
Tastes like cardboard… How does anyone like this recipe?
Sounds like someone left out the sugar. Or perhaps stale cornmeal?
This was delicious! I made a batch today to go along with my new year’s black eyed peas and it was a great combo. I normally use a mix but this was even better. Sweet but not too sweet. Just like I love cornbread! It’s also great with just a little butter on top and in the middle.
Tried it and it came out dry even after adding butter on top. I tried it again but this time I change the suggested temperature from 425 to 400.
Came out perfect. Cooks better on 400
Good to know Marie!
Yes I baked mine on 400 degrees too. This worked well.
This is perfect corn bread. I used almond milk and whole wheat pastry flour for half of the flour. It is important to avoid over mixing so I use a rubber scraper to combine wet and dry ingredients when making muffins or any quick bread.
Thanks for the tips Pat!
This came out really well. I have about 3 pieces left after a lunch of ham and bean soup and cornbread. Thank you for this recipe :)
You’re so welcome Tina!
Girl!! Omg I’ve wanted to make southern cornbread dressing for a while. I bought the cornmeal months ago lol but my initial attempt was terrible. Haven’t tried it again until today…Thanksgiving and all that lol. Finally a delicious recipe!! Tytyty. I’ll let you know how the dressing comes out 😁
Oh this makes me so happy to hear!
Great recipe. I changed ratio of cornmeal/flour to 1 1/2 cornmeal 1/2 flour and Did 1/2 milk, 1/2 full fat yogurt. And added a maple chipotle seasoning. Yum. Thanks so much for sharing.
Thanks for sharing Karen!
Can’t wait to make this! Apologies in advance if this is a dumb question – but can I sub Lactose-Free milk?
Thanks!
Erika
Hi Erika, we haven’t tried it with lactose free milk. You could give it a go with a full fat version of it if there is one.
I always use almond milk in the recipe and have no issues at all.
Thanks for sharing Elizabeth!