Old rations channel

[PawPaw]

Anybody want to share a recipe for authentic southern cornbread?

IIRC, my wife's grandmother's recipe was "a handful of corn meal, and handful of flour, and egg if you've got it." There must have been leavening. She was from Arkansas.

I grew up in Indiana, so we had some sugar in ours. I loves me some ham and beans and cornbread. The beans were Great Northerns.

About the best recipe is on the back of a Martha White cornmeal bag. Really. We don't use as much sugar as the recipe calls for, generally, just a tablespoon is enough. My wife says that a tablespoon of sugar helps the cornbread brown without making it sweet. Traditionalists use no sugar whatsoever.

[Greg]

Anybody want to share a recipe for authentic southern cornbread?

IIRC, my wife's grandmother's recipe was "a handful of corn meal, and handful of flour, and egg if you've got it." There must have been leavening. She was from Arkansas.

I grew up in Indiana, so we had some sugar in ours. I loves me some ham and beans and cornbread. The beans were Great Northerns.

I had a philosophical quandary with cornbread for a short time in college. It was corn, which is something you feed to cattle; so why were we making bread with cattle feed? The cows needed the grain more than me, and would help keep the cows delicious. Both sweet and regular versions of cornbread were available to me growing up. The sweet stuff was for holiday dinners, the regular stuff was for everyday meals.

When we were growing up, one of my mother's friends (we were friends with the kids, too) was a German immigrant. We always enjoyed her corn story, how she was shocked and offended when she got here and everybody ate corn and was always offering her some. Because where she grew up, they didn't grow corn as sweet as we have and all of it went for pig feed. So people were eating, and encouraging her to eat, what pigs eat.

[Steamforger]

I just can't fathom that anybody could ever have a problem with any cornbread.

Insanity.

[Old Grafton]

I grew up dirt poor and my siblings and I ate cornbread as a staple. The three "M"s-- meal, meat(pork or chicken) and multivitamins plus the greens and root crops/garden truck we grew fed us all well. I don't care how cornmeal's fixed it's all good. I'm having cornbread tonite with meatloaf and salad greens. Blackstrap molasses drizzled on the cornbread--the original 3rd "M". Mom knew about pellagra, hence the vitamins.

[Jered]

U
I'd actually prefer an issue of one modernized canteen, and one Klean Kanteen-ish bottle that you could cook in, along with a nesting cup and lid. If they would make a Jetboil-sized stove that would accommodate a cup that can nest on a Klean Kanteen, I would buy several.

Something like this? I haven't tried it out yet, but it seems well made and like it ought to work pretty well.

[toad]

http://www.forgesurvivalsupply.com/stor ... r-Bag.aspx

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlMqL0WFlQw

Mountain House makes some well rated freeze dried versions of MRE's but they are dependent on having a supply of good water and they are not real cheap in my opinion.
With the MealSpec bags you can do it your self. I wouldn't bother with using the aluminum foil wrapping the lady does in her video since I doubt I'd be using them enough to absorb any significant plastic leaching from the bag.

[JAG2955]

U
I'd actually prefer an issue of one modernized canteen, and one Klean Kanteen-ish bottle that you could cook in, along with a nesting cup and lid. If they would make a Jetboil-sized stove that would accommodate a cup that can nest on a Klean Kanteen, I would buy several.

Something like this? I haven't tried it out yet, but it seems well made and like it ought to work pretty well.

Neat. I'd rather have a pressurized gas though for the military, it's a lot faster. And if it's for my personal use, I'd rather have a wood-burning one, which you can also drop an alcohol/esbit stove into.

[Jered]

Neat. I'd rather have a pressurized gas though for the military, it's a lot faster. And if it's for my personal use, I'd rather have a wood-burning one, which you can also drop an alcohol/esbit stove into.

That one has no moving parts, and I suspect you could run it on any high proof spirit.

The problem with pressurized gas is the weight of the canisters.

[First Shirt]

Anybody want to share a recipe for authentic southern cornbread?

IIRC, my wife's grandmother's recipe was "a handful of corn meal, and handful of flour, and egg if you've got it." There must have been leavening. She was from Arkansas.

I grew up in Indiana, so we had some sugar in ours. I loves me some ham and beans and cornbread. The beans were Great Northerns.

I love my mother, but, trust me here, you DO NOT want her cornbread recipe! It's all "handfuls" and "a little dash" and "some". I can confirm that it does contain cornmeal, baking powder, salt, milk (or buttermilk), an egg, and some bacon grease. And requires a cast iron skillet to bake it in.

Other than that, ya'll are on your own!

ETA: This is pretty close to her recipe, but, again, ya'll are on your own, since she didn't ever use butter, it was all bacon grease, or lard, if, heaven forfend, she didn't have enough bacon grease.
http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/so ... cornbread/

[Denis]

I love my mother, but, trust me here, you DO NOT want her cornbread recipe! It's all "handfuls" and "a little dash" and "some". I can confirm that it does contain cornmeal, baking powder, salt, milk (or buttermilk), an egg, and some bacon grease. And requires a cast iron skillet to bake it in.

Other than that, ya'll are on your own!

ETA: This is pretty close to her recipe, but, again, ya'll are on your own, since she didn't ever use butter, it was all bacon grease, or lard, if, heaven forfend, she didn't have enough bacon grease.
http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/so ... cornbread/

That sounds rather nice. I will have to see if one can buy cornmeal here and have a go. I can certainly get ground maize (polenta), but not sure if that will substitute properly.