Sweet Skillet Cornbread

Ingredients

• 1 cup Yellow cornmeal
• 1 cup All-purpose flour
• ⅓ cup Sugar
• 1 Tbsp Baking powder
• ½ tsp Baking soda
• ¾ tsp Kosher salt
• 1 cup Buttermilk
• 2 Large eggs
• 4 Tbsp melted, plus 2 Tbsp for the skillet Unsalted butter

Method

1. Heat the oven to 425°F / 220°C. Put 2 Tbsp butter in a 10-inch cast-iron skillet and set the skillet in the oven while it heats.
2. Stir the cornmeal, flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a bowl. Whisk the buttermilk, eggs, and melted butter in another bowl.
3. Pour the wet mix into the dry and stir until you no longer see dry streaks. A few lumps are fine. Do not beat it smooth.
4. Take the skillet out carefully. The butter should be foaming. Swirl it over the bottom and up the sides, then pour in the batter. It will sizzle.
5. Bake 18–22 minutes, until the top is golden and a toothpick in the center comes out with a few moist crumbs, not wet batter. Cool 5 minutes in the skillet, then cut wedges. This is sweeter than a savory Southern pone. If you want it less sweet, use 2 Tbsp sugar.

Nutrition

Kitchen estimate only, not lab-verified. A side bread. Sugar and butter are the difference between this and a plain corn pone.

Guest diet / allergy swaps

Short kitchen notes for guests. A fuller gluten-free or dairy-free ingredient list, when we have one, is in the panels below.

• Low-sodium friendly

  Use ¼ tsp salt. The baking powder still has some sodium. This bread is not a salted cracker, but it is not salt-free either.

• Gluten-free style

  Replace the all-purpose flour with a cup-for-cup gluten-free blend and keep the cornmeal. Read the cornmeal and baking powder. The edge will be a little more tender.

• Dairy-free

  Use a neutral oil in the batter and the skillet, and a plant milk soured with 1 Tbsp lemon juice in place of buttermilk. The crust will not taste like browned butter.

  • United States: Oil for the butter, and plant milk soured with 1 Tbsp lemon juice for the buttermilk. The flour is still wheat.
  • United Kingdom: The same oil-and-soured-plant-milk swap. This cornbread is not gluten free.

• No egg

  This batter needs the eggs to rise and set. There is no tidy substitute here.

• No pork

  The skillet is butter, not bacon drippings. Keep it that way if pork is off the table.

• No cast-iron skillet

  Heat the butter in a 9-inch cake pan or an oven-safe skillet of a similar size. A cold pan will not give you the same edge.