Cornmeal Mush For Breakfast

Before you could buy it in the grocery store and before polenta (Italian word) was a fashionable thing to serve, we made cornmeal mush and fried it – I assume it was a popular depression era food.  The other day I suggested to Bev that we buy some of the packaged variety, but she quickly said she preferred homemade so off to the kitchen I went.

Since my last couple of batches turned out too watery, I did a little web search to get the cornmeal to water proportions and the cooking time.  I settled on this recipe from Taste Of Home.

4 cups water, divided

1 cup cornmeal (your favorite color)

1 teaspoon salt

Boil 3 cups water and add salt. Combine well the remaining water with cornmeal (this will prevent lumping); add to boiling water. Stir until mixture returns to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and simmer for 1 hour, stirring occasionally (not a chance - see notes below).

Pour into a greased 8-in. x 4-in. loaf pan (or line the pan with plastic wrap). Chill for 8 hours or overnight.

After chilling run something around the edges to be sure it isn’t sticking then invert pan on a cutting board (or just lift it out by the plastic wrap but still invert as the crusty top side needs to be against the cutting board for slicing.  

Notes: The key to making this is the final water content and if made correctly, it’s a little bit rubbery and can be held by one end without pulling apart – mine passed this test.  It can also be fried without flour to hold it together – it passed this test as well.

However, don’t believe the second sentence in instruction 1 for a second – unless you want to jack hammer the stuck part from the bottom of the pan, it must be stirred very often.  I left the lid off and cooked it for 45 minutes enjoying the little volcano’s of steam as they erupted. 

I usually try to make it when I’m in the kitchen doing something else – making pasta sauce in this case.

To serve, cut into 1/2-in. thick slices and fry in hot oil (I like some bacon grease with the oil).  Fry to a golden brown, flip and repeat – remove and drain on paper towels for a couple of minutes.  Since it really likes to stick to the pan, I always use a non-stick skillet.
 

When I was a kid, we ate it open faced on a piece of buttered white bread, making it a bread sandwich, but this time, I topped mine with a couple of fried eggs and it was delicious.

I used some whole grain corn meal that I’d bought from a farmer at a fair and kept in the freezer and while it was very good, I still want to try the pre-made version to see if homemade is worth the effort.  I think I’ve posted about mush before but wanted to provide the above tips and have them recorded on the blog - so I'll know what to do next time.

Photos best if enlarged by clicking on them.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by Almost Heaven South.

Larry

12/6/13 meal date