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The One Cornbread Mix That Tastes as Good as Homemade

Danielle Centoni
Danielle Centoni
Danielle Centoni is a James Beard Award-winning food writer, editor, recipe developer, and cookbook author based in Portland, Oregon. Her latest cookbook is "Fried Rice: 50 Ways to Stir Up The World's Favorite Grain."
published Jan 3, 2022
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Credit: Lauren Volo

When my kids were little, I quickly learned that they’d eat just about anything if there was cornbread involved. As soon as they opened their mouths to start complaining — before even taking a bite — I’d carry out the cornbread and suddenly they’d be all smiles. Yay! Cornbread! No complaints if the skillet of golden goodness was at the table.

So, of course that meant chili became a staple and I’d make it any which way I could, tucking in all sorts of vegetables that they’d normally scowl at. But I didn’t stop there. I also served cornbread with stews, soups, and pots of beans and greens. Anything that I deemed hearty and a little lonely without a carb-y side dish usually got a cornbread accompaniment — and still does! 

We still eat a lot of cornbread in our house, and even though my kids are now teens, they’re still just as stoked to have cornbread for dinner. But the best part is now they make it themselves — thanks to my favorite cornbread mix.

Credit: Danielle Centoni

Buy: Fleischmann’s Simply Homemade Cornbread Mix, $1.78 for 15 ounces at Walmart

I usually make cornbread from scratch. It’s easy enough and (until fairly recently) I hadn’t found a cornbread mix that I liked. But then I did a taste test of cornbread mixes and found one that was incredibly close to my homemade recipe. Fleischmann’s Simply Homemade Cornbread Mix makes cornbread and corn muffins that are wonderfully tender, not dense or dry, with a rich corn flavor I want with hearty chilis and stews. It’s not Southern cornbread, so it’s on the sweet side, but it doesn’t go overboard into dessert territory. 

It’s the one mix that can rival homemade, so I’ve started stocking up on it. Unlike most other mixes I’ve seen, cornmeal is the first ingredient, not wheat flour, and I can really taste the difference. And it’s so easy and fun to make that my kids will happily volunteer to mix up a batch. Of course, once I have them in the kitchen it’s a lot easier to recruit them into far less desirable kitchen tasks, like unloading the dishwasher. Yay! Cornbread! It continues to make everything better.

Do you have a favorite cornbread mix? Tell us about it in the comments below!

This post originally ran on Kitchn. See it there: This Cornbread Mix Is the Only One That Rivals My Homemade Recipe