Chef Emily Cook on recipe development and forgiveness
One of the things I like the most about cooking – and the hospitality industry as a whole – is its forgiveness.Sometimes recipes don’t turn out right. We don’t see that as failure – we look at it as a learning opportunity. Sometimes it’s not about nailing it perfectly, it’s about not messing it up. The trick is just to not mess it up the same way twice. This recipe for cornbread that I’m sharing with you has gone through a lot of trial and error. I had to throw out a batch yesterday because I tried butter in the pan instead of oil and it burned. When I write recipes, I think about ways that I may mess it up. I walk through it carefully in my mind before I start measuring ingredients. I envision how might this go wrong, I take a step back, and then I go for it.
The finished product
Recipe
Cornbread
- 4 oz butter, melted and cooled
- ¼ cup vegetable oil, plus more for pan
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- ½ cup cornmeal
- ½ cup sugar
- 2 tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp baking soda
- 2 large eggs
- 1 cup milk
- Place a 12” cast iron skillet on the middle rack of the oven. Preheat the oven and the skillet to 425 F.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, cornmeal, salt, baking powder, and baking soda.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together the sugar, eggs, and milk. Add the melted and cooled butter and mix.
- Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix to combine
- Remove the hot cast iron skillet from the oven and coat it with some vegetable oil. Carefully, add the batter to the hot skillet and smooth out on top
- Bake for about 20 minutes or until golden and delicious