Bread Machine Northern Cornbread the Way We Like It

We started with a recipe from Bread Dad who has lots of helpful tips about making a quick sweet bread, like a muffin bread or tea bread or cornbread, in a bread machine.

My research seems to confirm Bread Dad's take, that the sweeter, moister cornbread we like up here is Northern style, and Southern cornbread is savory, dry and crumbly. 

We substituted olive oil for butter, and maple syrup for the sugar, since they are saying that maple syrup doesn't cause glycemic spikes the way other sugars do. Plus we LOVE it!

Probably butter and maple syrup would be what New Englanders had on hand to make cornbread, but we have tested and confirmed, this bread tastes sweeter and moister with the olive oil/maple syrup combo.

We started this as a Thanksgiving side dish but my 10-year-old nephew considers this a genuine sweet treat, so now we make it alot! Perfect for Presidents' Day, too, (those old guys liked cornbread). 

Ingredients

1/3 cup olive oil       (or 6 Tablespoons butter if you prefer)

1 cup maple syrup    (or 1 cup sugar or honey)

1 1/4 cup milk (optional; I know this because I forgot it last time! the cornbread was nice and sweet and moist and delicious, just a little smaller)

2 eggs (lightly beaten) (if vegan, use your choice of egg substitutes) 

1 cup yellow cornmeal

1 1/2 cups flour

1/2 tsp. salt

1 tsp. baking power

1 tsp. baking soda

Our method

My bread machine is an Amazon Basics. Like all baking machines I have used, start by putting all liquids at bottom and then dry ingredients.

So put ingredients in the machine in the order listed. 

I add the leavening (baking powder and baking soda) last, sprinkling it over the flour, and then use the measuring spoon to sort of fluff mix just the leavenings and flour part on top. This is how I get around separate bowls for mixing flour, etc. in recipes. 

Settings

I use the "CAKE" setting on my bread machine. I have also been successful when I used the "Quick Bread" setting, when first experimenting. 

The CAKE setting takes 1 hour 50 minutes for the whole process. The quick bread setting is 2 hours 40 minutes. 

I typically bake breads on my DARK crust setting, because I like to make very sure the center is done. However, this one will be slightly overbaked on dark setting, (still good to eat!). I will probably go with Light next time, I used Medium this time.

When I serve my family I sometimes cut off the floury crusts all around so it looks like one giant square serving of cornbread! Plus I get to taste it by eating those yummy crust pieces!

  

Cornmeal Cakes with Antique U.S. Presidents

We celebrated everything, with kids...

On George Washington's Birthday, or on Lincoln's Birthday, or on President's Day, we made cornmeal "hoecakes" or pancakes.

On Lincoln's birthday we played with, yup, Lincoln logs. We decorated with money, (pennies and dollar bills). Of course we read the books, early readers, Abe Lincoln's Hat, stories about George, about Martha. Age appropriate stories, and got to the meat of the stuff when they were a little older.

Here's a cornmeal pancake recipe. 

Equal parts cornmeal and flour; or all cornmeal (my preference)

An egg or two, or omit and use a little baking powder and a little baking soda (less than a tsp ea.)

a spoonful of sugar or honey, if desired

a pinch of salt, if desired

enough "sour milk" to mix lightly into a lumpy batter:

    use buttermilk if you have it, or add a squeeze of lemon to            milk; or substitute yogurt or sour cream

Fry like pancakes on a hot griddle. When bubbles show on top, it's time to flip. 

Serve with butter and honey. 

These are the all cornmeal version, no leavening other than eggs. The cornmeal is very tender and sweet.

(Or maple syrup: I read that Washington aspired to plant maples at Mt. Vernon, ever the entrepreneur, as people tried to convince him that maple sugar would one day be a successful product, see "founders archives" at this link: https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-20-02-0101

But of course maples are New England trees, they don't like Virginia weather. I wonder if John Adams ate them with maple syrup?)