April 11, 2009 - 5:47pm
Sourdough corn bread
I am a sourdough newbie and constantly looking for new recipes to play with my starter. Today, I tried making sourdough corn bread and it turned out surprisingly good. It looked very much like regular corn bread but with much softer texture and the flavor was just wonderful. I have been using my extra sponge to make pancakes for breakfast. Now, I can use it to make corn bread for a quick and dirty dinner to go with chili. I just love sourdough!
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Sourdough does give a nice texture and flavor to a variety of things, doesn't it? You've inpsired me to give this a try as corn muffins, maybe as a variation of gothicgirl's maple-bacon muffins (adding in some baking soda to react with the starter and really lighten up the texture like it does with waffles). I've used sourdough starter to make blueberry muffins (and cinnamon rolls of course) that have all come out great.
Keep experimenting and Happy Baking...
Oooo they sound so good. Do you mind if I ask for your muffin recipes? I have some but of course the more the better!
The cornbread sounds good. Do you have a recipe/formula for it? Do you mind sharing it? :)
Preheat oven to 425F. Grease an 8 x 8-inch baking pan liberally with shortening or butter. In a large mixing bowl, combine
1 C stone-ground yellow cornmeal
2 T sugar
1/4 C butter
1/2 tsp salt
1 C scalded milk
Stir to dissolve butter and sugar. let cool until just warm. Blend in
1 C sourdough starter
1 egg
1 tsp baking powder
Beat well. Pour into prepared pan. Bake at 425F for 30 - 35 minutes. Serve warm with butter and preserves. Makes 9 servings.
The texture and flavor are just lovely!
Nice recipe! Hint: change the baking powder to baking soda and you wil get a very bubbly reaction between the soda and the acid in your starter, that is what makes the baked goods rise nice and light as a feather.
Yes, I noticed you used baking soda instead of powder. I was actually surprised t see the reaction between the baking powder and the sourdough starter; it was VERY active and truly fascinating. If baking soda reacts even more than that, I can't wait to try it next time.
I tried this today because of starter overload. I soaked the cornmeal overnight, other than that I pretty much followed the recipe. Came out lovely!
althetrainer, in response to your question above for recipes, I actually first tried SD muffins after seeing JMonkey's lofty ones on his blog here 2 years ago. His recipe is from Mike Avery's excellent website here.
I modified Mike's to fit my standard spelt muffins here, but I haven't written that up anywhere. Basically, instead of the baking powder in my spelt muffin recipe, I use 2 tsp baking soda and 1 cup of starter at 100% hydration, then deduct the amount of flour in the starter from the recipe's total flour, reduce the 4 eggs to 3, and the oil to about 2/3 cup.
If you're interested in SD cinnamon rolls - which are much more time consuming but oh, so worth it, my recipe is here.
Report back to us on what you've tried, enjoy!
Thanks mountaindog! I can't wait to try them all!
Mountaindog, have you tried putting chocolate chips in your sourdough muffins? Well, I would love to make blueberry muffins but tomorrow is Easter and my 7-year-old requests chocolate chips muffins. I am just not sure if chocolate will go well with sourdough. Any ideas?