Good Eats Night

Yes, I cooked.

So tonight I made the Super Easy Cornbread that my mom taught me to make, fresh beans from the Bean Snapping, thick sliced onion and Chicken breast cooked on my tiny one-person cheap George Foreman grill...

It was a simple dinner that turned out very tasty except I did not season the fresh green beans....

You all MUST try making cornbread!!! Three ingredients. Milk, self-rising white cornmeal (but I am sure yellow would work - but I do NOT like YELLOW cornbread) and bacon drippings/butter.

Try it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Comfort Foodz: A Sunday Night

Comfort food.

What more do I need to say?

The other night I served up:

Yes, this old pie tin has a
history and a story...

• Canned shelly (bean only, no green) home-grown pink half-runner beans, also known  as pink-half-runners and favorited by southern Appalachian folks in the know
• Super thick slices of sweet yellow onions that you can sink your teeth into
• Plain white cornbread
• Pork tenderloin sliced, floured and fried.

I simply heated the beans that came from the family farm. I added NOTHING for nothing was necessary. My mother grew and canned them, with a little help from my brother, myself, and my ex husband.

I baked my mother's cornbread recipe. Self-rising white cornmeal, bacon grease (staple in my kitchen), and sweet milk. I'll post this recipe soon (if it isn't already in here somewhere).

The pork tenderloin was on sale at Kroger for $1.99 a pound. Instead of cooking pork chops, I did the following:

• Rinsed
• Sliced the 3.5 pound tenderloin into about 15 fairly tick slices
• Brined them until ready to cook about 5 at a time
• Pulled one slice out of the brine at a time, dripping wet
• Flopped that puppy down in an old pie plate filled with flour
• Added a little fresh ground black pepper and Penzey's Northwoods Spice to one side and flipped to coat with flour.
• Dropped the meat into the hot canola oil in a preheated fry-pan on medium to medium-high heat (5 at a time)  and turned after about 8 minutes. 

I'm a little fuzzy on how long to cook pork.  But, I know I do not leave Any PinK meat so I did a total of 15-20 minutes per slice.  While I'll eat rare beef, I like my pork and cooked "over-done".

The Easiest Cornbread Ever!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My mother has been making corn bread for longer than I have been around. She never had bothered to write down the recipe until the prison my Dad worked at published a cookbook by the employees... "Doing Time in the Kitchen" Pictured on the cover is Brushy Mountain Prison in Morgan County TN. Needless to say, every time my mother tried to teach me to make the corn bread, I only got confused. She would say "Put about this much corn meal, then some bacon grease, then mix in enough milk to make it thinner than you would think it needs to be. Now, the moisture of the cornmeal can be different from bag to bag depending on the moisture of the corn, the day it was ground and etc." YOU GET THE POINT! It was all subjective and made my head spin. SO - when Mom finally wrote it down and worked it out - the clouds parted, angels sang and I was happy!

I grew up on WHITE cornbread in the house while every-time we went out to eat, the cornbread was yellow... WHAT IS YELLOW CORNBREAD? THIS IS STRANGE... Yes, I like white cornbread and it does taste different than yellow.

And, without further ado - The recipe!

White Cornbread

1 c Three Rivers self-rising cornmeal (There are other brands, this one is local to us)

3 T bacon fat or margarine or butter

3/4 c Sweet milk

Preheat oven to 450F degrees

Put up to 1 T bacon fat or margarine in an 8 inch seasoned iron skillet and heat on the stove eye (should be hot but not smoking hot).

In a bowl, mix cornmeal, 2T bacon fat or margarine/butter and the sweet milk (just meaning not buttermilk). I use a fork to mix - but hey, use what you want - right?

The mixture is going to seem a little runny, but it works...

Pour into the hot skillet, place in oven and bake 15-18 minutes.

Turn out on a plate and revel at what you have done. Ogle it - love on it when it won't burn you! If you lick it or drool on it - don't get caught....

Serves 2-4 people

This cornbread is: 

• Super plain
• Be served with many meals 
• Takes no effort, time, or talent (thus I can bake it)

You can fancy it up with corn or spices or whatever you would like.