Danielle Centoni is a James Beard Award-winning food writer, editor, recipe developer, and cookbook author based in Portland, Oregon. Her latest cookbook is "Fried Rice: 50 Ways to Stir Up The World's Favorite Grain."
updated Nov 11, 2022
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When my kids were much younger, I quickly learned that they’d eat just about anything if there was cornbread involved. As soon as they opened their mouths to start complaining — before even taking a bite — I’d carry out a skillet of cornbread and suddenly they’d be all smiles. Yay! No complaints if there was warm cornbread was at the table.
Naturally, that meant chili became a weeknight staple and I’d make it any which way I could, sneaking in all sorts of vegetables that they’d normally scowl at. But I didn’t stop there. I also served cornbread with stews, soups, and so many pots of beans and greens. Anything that I deemed hearty and a little lonely without a carb-y side dish usually got a cornbread accompaniment. I mean, who’s gonna complain about that?
We still eat a lot of cornbread in our house, and even though my kids are now teens, they’re still just as stoked to have cornbread for dinner. But the best part is now they can make it themselves — thanks to my favorite cornbread mix.
I usually make cornbread from scratch. It’s easy enough and (until fairly recently), I hadn’t found a cornbread mix that I liked. But then I did a taste test of nine cornbread mixes and found one that was incredibly close to my homemade recipe.
Fleischmann’s Simply Homemade Cornbread Mix makes cornbread and corn muffins that are wonderfully tender, not dense or dry, with a rich corn flavor that marries well with hearty chilis and stews. It’s not Southern cornbread, so it’s on the sweet side, but it doesn’t go overboard into dessert territory either.
It’s the one mix I tested that can rival the homemade stuff, so I’ve started stocking up on it. Unlike most other mixes I’ve seen or tasted, cornmeal is the first ingredient, not wheat flour, and I can really taste the difference. It’s so easy and fun to make that my kids will happily volunteer to mix up a batch.
Of course, once I have them in the kitchen, it’s also lot easier to recruit them into far less desirable kitchen tasks, like unloading the dishwasher. Yay! Cornbread! See, it continues to make everything better.
Do you have a favorite cornbread mix? Tell us about it in the comments below!
