The Best Sweet Cornbread
The Best Sweet Cornbread – soft, tender moist cornbread recipe that’s sweet just like I like it. Reminds me of Marie Calendar’s cornbread.
If you need a sweet cornbread to pair with chilis or soups, this is the best sweet cornbread.
THE BEST SWEET CORNBREAD
I’ve been searching for the perfect cornbread.
I was at a church function and our friends said his mom was famous for her cornbread so of course I had to try it. It tasted like cake. I like cake.
Turns out it was actually made WITH a cake mix – go figure. So yes, I like my cornbread sweet but not quite that sweet. Almost. Next recipe.
I’ve tried recipe after recipe and almost settled on one.
Until I happened to be at my friend’s house and her mom was telling me how good her cornbread recipe was and that it was sweet like Marie Calendar’s.
It was kind of like when I was trying on wedding dresses. I found a lot that I liked but didn’t LOVE. They were all just missing that little something.
Then I tried on the dress meant for me.
The dress was discontinued (or as I like to look at it – one of a kind), inexpensive, modest, and the perfect mixture of satin and detail.
I knew there wasn’t any reason to look any further. I just knew.
So then I as I left my friend’s house I knew I had one more recipe to try. My husband looked at me like I was a little crazy when I went into the kitchen at 10pm to make cornbread…yet again.
But I had to know. The result? I said YES to the cornbread. YES!!!
Soft, tender, flat top – no weird bubbling (don’t ask), sweet and moist with just the right amount of cornbread texture. Hope you love it like I do! You can even freeze this cornbread if you want to make it ahead of time.
CAN I ADD CORN TO THIS CORNBREAD?
In my opinion, cornbread should be made in its purest form without corn. When you add corn it turns into a spoon bread, corn pudding, or Corn Souffle.
If you love the Best Sweet Cornbread recipe, you’ll these recipes:
The Best Sweet Cornbread
The Best Sweet Cornbread - soft, tender moist cornbread recipe that's sweet just like I like it.
Ingredients
- 1 cup unsalted butter , softened
- 1 1/3 cup granulated sugar
- 4 eggs
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 cups buttermilk (see Note for easy substitution)
- 1 1/4 cups fine cornmeal (found by the flour)
- 2 3/4 cups flour
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 9x13 baking dish.
In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar. Add the eggs and salt and mix until combined. Add the buttermilk and mix until thoroughly combined. Next, add the cornmeal, flour, baking powder, and baking soda. Mix to incorporate.
Pour into prepared baking dish. Bake until golden. This will be different for every oven. START checking it for doneness at 25 minutes and bake longer until golden if needed (up to 35 minutes)
- Serve warm with butter and honey.
Recipe Notes
Buttermilk Substitution: If you don't have buttermilk you can add 1 tablespoon of vinegar to each cup of milk and let it sit for a couple of minutes.
This can easily be halved and baked in a 9x9 pan.
Source: my friend Rachel's mom, Kim Smith who got it from her church cookbook. Original author is listed as Cheri McClean.
is that all purpose flour because you are adding baking powder and soda
Yes. All my recipes use all-purpose unless specified.
I did the substitution with milk and white distilled vinegar. It is beyond soupy after cooking it for 25 min and I don’t understand why. Any ideas? I added another 10 min, but I am not hopeful that it will change much. I have made it twoce before beautifully with buttermilk and we LOVE It!
Weird. Is your vinegar expired?
This is the most amazing cornbread I have ever eaten, never mind made! It is the perfect density. Not too heavy, not too fluffy-cakey. It’s not cake-sweet but it is definitely sweet cornbread. I also sprinkled sugar over the top of the bread before baking it (an old family tradition used in baking cornbreads and muffins). I’m not sure why people have had trouble with the directions (maybe they’ve been rewritten since people made those comments?). I should mention that I mixed everything by hand. I softened each stick of butter in the microwave just up to the point where it started to melt; creamed the butter and sugar, sprinkled the salt over that mixture then put in the eggs. Hand mixed until smooth. Added the buttermilk and stirred until smooth. In my sifter, I put in the flour, baking powder and soda, and the cornmeal-sifted it out into another bowl. Put half of the dry ingredients into the wet, mixed, added the remainder-voila! Baked it in a 13×9 glass pan (greased) at 350° for 25 minutes. Very wet at 25 minutes, so I increased the temperature to 375° and left the cornbread in for another 10 minutes. It came out perfect. DELICIOUS!
So glad you loved it! We do!
This recipe took significantly longer than 35 minutes to cook through!
Could be your oven or your pan…
This is an almost true to form recipe, and we highly enjoyed it! My convection oven bakes hot- set at 375* and the time was pretty spot on. I gathered from other comments set a little higher then recipe (was shooting for around 400*ish with my hellish oven) and it was EXQUISITE! I’ve shopped around, the flavor, texture, and density was perfect. Thank you from one girl who eats everything to another!
Yayyy! Wish I could high five you in person!
I have made this several times, it’s a family favorite! So good! There are lumps, but don’t worry! It turns out fantastic every time!
Thanks for the feedback!
I love this recipe!! I was looking for a sweet cornbread recipe to enter into a work chili and cornbread contest. My/your cornbread won the contest hands down. I did add a can of cream of corn to the recipe and the cooking time was a little longer. Everyone loved it! Thank you for sharing!
Ooh I love that you added corn.
Added – Rhubarb
I’ve made this recipe and my family loves it, but I just tried an unusual variation, and it is wonderful. I made the recipe exactly as directed and then stirred in 1 1/2 Cups of chopped fresh rhubarb into the batter and backed as directed. (It’s spring, and I have some rhubarb, and I didn’t feel like making a pie). The rhubarb and cornbread flavors together are delicious, I can’t stop eating it!
What an interesting combination! Yummy.
Thank you for sharing this recipe. My family loved it. Instructions are super easy.
I’m so glad you like it.
Turned out good. Moist, not dry, like Bobs Mill recipe on the bag.
I used their medium grind. I had X-large eggs and only added 3. I haven’t figured out the science exactly but recall if you want less fluff like a cake you add less baking powder. I took off 1/4 teaspoon. I also decreased the flour by 1/4 cup. I don’t like dry fall-apart cornbread.
My oven seems to be heating differently and it took longer.
It had crispy, sweet (almost candied) edges and the inside was moist and sweet enough -? or too much. Butter & sugar was not lacking, but I am not complaining. Yum!
I took a photo, but apparently this page/blog site does not allow us to post our results. Maybe I’ll add the hashtag #girlwhoateeverything in my #slowfood album in fb.
Oh shoot! Wish I could have seem your picture!
SO GOOD!! Thank you! I too, have been searching! Loved it!
Oh good!!!!
I’ve been making cornbread from a passed down recipe for over 40 years. I tried your recipe with some chili, and it was wonderful! The lumps in the batter are not going to matter once it’s baked. I always blend my batter by hand. Follow directions and then experiment a little if you want to make this recipe your own. Perfect the way it is though. Thank you Christy. ♡
Thank you Ruth! That makes me smile.
I made this yesterday. Both my husband and I agree that this is the best cornbread EVER!
I love hearing that!
This is the best recipe EVER! My husband made a large pot of chili for the game today and I thought a nice cornbread would be a delicious companion. Wow. It’s the best! Thank you!
Thank you! I’m so glad you agree.
Fantastic. For the buttermilk sub, I used lemon juice instead of vinegar and you could taste the citrus in the bread. It was amazing. This is my go-to cornbread from now on.
Made these today – very nice. Sweet and tender with a strong butter smell and flavor. At 25 minutes they were completely liquid in the middle, so I left them in for another 10 minutes and they were completely dry although the top looked the same. So be careful on those last few minutes of cooking time!
These were my 2nd cornbread try this winter – the first was a traditional non-sweet cornbread – the more southern version I guess – and it was gritty and dry. This version was much closer to what I want.
I have made this recipe twice this week. It was a big hit and quite delicious. The only change to the recipe that I made is I separated the eggs and meet the whites until they reached peaks. I then folded the egg whites into the rest of the batter once it was all mixed. I also bake them in a muffin top pan.
I hate dry crumbly cornbread, this recipe is the best I have had in a long time.
As a matter of preference, I pretty much always cut sugar in half in cornbread recipes – so I did it for this one and then followed the rest as described. Yum! I didn’t miss the sugar at all in the half-recipe that I made to go with our dinner. This recipe’s been bookmarked! 🙂
I just made this recipe in muffin form for my granddaugher,s Thanksgiving lunch at school tomorrow, of course I sample everything I make (lol, good excuse right?). This recipe is DELICIOUS. A keeper for sure. Thanks for sharing. I’m sure the kiddies will enjoy these little beauties. Awesome corn muffins. Awesome!
So happy to hear that.
OMGoodness!! The best cornbread I’ve EVER made. Love it. Easy to make.i can’t wait for my father to try it. He’s the worlds cornbread expert. I’ll keep you informed.
Thank yoU!! I tried many versions and this is the one I love.
I tried to print the recipe and what I got was pages of comments, I had to turn my printer off so I didn’t run out of ink. Had to take my laptop to the kitchen. Halved it, but used my own common sense when it came to dry ingredients, then add wet ingredients. This was the worst written recipe I’ve ever tried, but it’s in the oven and if my kids like it I’ll “speak my mind” and let you know
Haha. Okay. Hope they like it.
Also, do you know which browser you used? I can’t replicate the printing issue.
Way too much butter. The pan was pooling with melted butter. Next time I’d use one-half cup of butter. Also, definitely need to bake for at least 15-20min longer.
That’s strange. Did you mix it well.
I just made this into cornbread muffins, absolutely wonderful! For me the baking time was lessened by about 8 minutes because of the muffin tin. So glad I tried this recipe!
Glad you loved them!
This sounds delicious! I;m going to make it next week with some chili 🙂 But it’s just for my husband & I, so I was wondering, if I halved it, could I use a 9 inch iron skillet to male it in? Wondering if you’ve ever tried it. I do make my cornbread in a skillet usually but have been in search for a different cornbread recipe.
Yes! you can definitely half it.
Perfect compliment to a chili i made. Bread was awesome.
Love hearing that!
Without a doubt, the single worse recipe I have ever come across. Myself and 14 guests of mine all agree. Followed directions precisely and what turned out was completely void of any flavor. A complete waste of time and incredients. This from someone who is known for their awesome varieties of cornbread.
I’m sorry you feel that way. 99.9 percent of the other people who made it love it. Maybe you didn’t make it correctly?
I would love to try a recipe you like!
I made this today, and it is delicious! I added a cup or so of thawed frozen corn, and sprinkled a light amount of sugar on top of the batter before it went in the oven. Otherwise, made the recipe exactly as directed. I didn’t find the batter lumpier than any normal cornbread batter, I stirred it well and worked the lumps out by hand. The batter was nicely thick. It took around 35 minutes in my oven and at my altitude (I live in the Denver area). This is a keeper!
Thank you! My husband is from Denver.
This is very similar to my cornbread recipie already but just looking to switch things up I made it. Now this is my cornbread recipie. My picky picky kids even ate it. Thank You for this GEM !! The Guerra Family 🙂 <3
You are so welcome Nicole!
This is very similar to my cornbread recipie already but just looking to switch things up I made it. Now this is my cornbread recipie. My picky picky kids even ate it. Thank You for this GEM !! The Guerra Family 🙂 <3