Comfort Food

One of the things I love about fall is that my family and I start cooking comfort foods. As soon as the first cold snap (which, in Alabama, really isn't that cold - but you would think it was ten below from seeing the girls walking around everywhere in over sized sweatshirts and Ugg boots), my mother starts cooking soups and stews and all kinds of cold-weather dishes.  Here are a few of my favorite fall comfort foods:

Hamburger Hash for Two

This is one of my favorite quick dinners.

2 large potatoes, peeled and chopped

1 pound ground beef

1/2 small onion, chopped

Garlic Salt

Seasoned Salt

Spray a saute pan with cooking spray. Put ground beef, onions and potatoes in pan and heat on high. Stir in garlic salt and seasoned salt to taste.  Cook until beef is browned and potatoes start to get crispy. Drain off grease before serving. We eat this as a meal by itself, or sometimes we will cook cornbread and tomato soup to go with it.

 

Buttermilk Cornbread

When I was a freshman in college, one of the guys in my Freshman Composition class was talking one day about how much he missed home and his mother's home cooking. He said that he'd been craving some good cornbread all semester. I should have cooked some for him (maybe I would have snagged him up - he was pretty cute), but instead, I told him that I could tell him how to make cornbread because it was easy. He seemed skeptical, but I wrote down the recipe for him and told him how to pick out a black skillet, and he decided that he would try it. He came back to class the next week and told me that I was a genius. He said that he'd made cornbread better than his mama's (I hope he never told his mama that). Cornbread is one of the easiest things to make. I have friends who are so intimidated by cooking, especially cornbread, because they think it is hard. Trust me, it isn't. Anyone can make good cornbread. The guy from my Freshman Comp class is my proof (He had never cooked anything in his life, ever. I remember telling the same guy how to do his laundry and how to get grease stains out of his jeans. Which really makes me wonder why he never did snag me up...maybe I reminded him too much of his mother? I guess I'll never know...).

2 cups of cornmeal (yellow or white - I like yellow, but either will work)

1 1/2 cups buttermilk

1 egg

Pinch of salt

1/2 stick butter

 

Spray a black skillet with cooking spray and place 1/2 stick of butter in the bottom of the pan. Place pan in an oven heated to 400 degrees to melt the butter. While the pan is heating, whisk together the cornmeal, milk, egg and salt. If the mixture is too thick, you can add a little extra milk. Once all the butter is melted, pour cornmeal mixture into the hot pan and bake on the top rack of the oven at 400 degrees until golden brown.  Allow to cool in the pan for a few minutes, then turn out onto a plate.

Note:  If you don't want to buy a whole carton of buttermilk, you can use regular milk - just add 1 tablespoon of mayonnaise to the mixture as well and you'll never know the difference.