Skillet Cornbread

I am on a role with posting old recipes. Although I should be going over my presentation that I have to give in about 3 hours, I have decided to take a mid-day break from all of of hustle and bustle of grad school, which I am sure would be frowned up on by many, lol. I found this recipe on Two Peas and Their Pod. However, it originally came from Pioneer Woman Cooks! Ree just recently (within a few months) came out with her first cookbook and has an amazing blog full of easy to make, flavorful recipes. She seems like such a joyful woman and I have high hopes of getting to meet her one day on a book tour. I have spend hours on her Blog recently and she always has fun stories, beautiful pictures, and tasty recipes galore on there.

I made this skillet cornbread in a normal cake pan and put it in the oven because at the time I did not have a cast iron skillet. However, Adam is huge on cast iron skillets and just recently purchased one for us. So I am sure that the next time I make this it will be the "Ree way" of making it. This was my first attempt with cornbread and it went fairly well. No big surprises, or catastrophic events, to speak of. I also made another one of Ree's recipes to go with her cornbread which I will be posting in a few minutes hopefully. That post will also talk about her new cookbook. It was helpful because they both call for buttermilk :)

Skillet Cornbread

1 cup yellow cornmeal
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 tsp. salt
1 Tbsp. baking powder
1 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup milk
1 large egg
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 cup + 2 Tbsp. shortening

*Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.

*In a bowl, combine cornmeal, flour, salt and baking powder & whisk together.

*Measure buttermilk and milk in a measuring cup. Stir in the egg with a fork. Add baking soda and stir.

*Pour into the bowl with the dry ingredients and stir with a fork just until combined.

*Melt 1/4 cup shortening in the microwave.

*Slowly add melted shortening to the batter, stirring until combined.

*In an iron skillet over high heat, melt the remaining 2 Tbsp. shortening. Pour the batter into the hot skillet and spread to even out the surface. Cook on the stovetop for about a minute, then bake in the oven for 15 to 20 minutes, or until golden brown. (I did this in a normal cake pan)

This is the picture of my cornbread with the other Pioneer Woman recipe that I made to go with it. They were a GREAT combination!