Cornmeal Johnnycake Recipe

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Johnnycakes are something I discovered years ago when I borrowed a cookbook from the library when I was in middle school. As many of you might know already, I’ve always been obsessed with self-sufficiency – learning how to make and grow the things most people would go to the store for. So my curiosity led me to check out a cookbook about early American recipes.

Learning about the recipes of early American families was so fascinating. I wanted to experience what they tasted and what they cooked out of necessity and convenience for the ingredients they had on hand. I vividly imagined a family in their cabin frying up a batch of hearty johnnycakes in preparation for a long day of hard work.

One of the easiest recipes in the book was for johnnycakes. It’s basically a fried cornmeal flatbread that the Native Americans had taught the settlers to make from ground corn. It looks like a pancake yet denser and even somewhat savory. You can eat it with syrup like pancakes (which is delicious) but what I realized it was amazing for was as a substitute for cornbread.

I LOVE cornbread with chili, but what I really want to do is dunk the bread into the soup. However, my cornbread usually falls apart into a million crumbs the second I try to do that. Johnnycakes combine the flavor and texture of cornbread with a stronger backbone that will allow you to dunk into your chili as much as you please. You can literally use it as a cornbread spoon which is, in my opinion, the best thing ever.

So here’s my own take on traditional johnnycakes- They’re very similar to the original recipe in the book, but I’ve added a few ingredients to make them slightly more palatable to a modern eater. They’re still very simple and filling!

INGREDIENTS

• 1 cup yellow cornmeal
• 1/2 cup all purpose flour
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1.5 tbsp melted unsalted butter (or oil)
• 1 tbsp honey
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1 large egg
• additional butter for greasing pan/frying

This recipe makes ~7 small johnnycakes. Just double it if you need to feed more mouths 🙂

1. Combine dry ingredients into bowl (cornmeal, flour, baking powder + salt).

2. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and add egg, milk, melted butter (or oil), and honey.

3. Mix until well incorporated and no lumps remain. The batter should be like a thick pancake batter.

4. Heat a griddle or cast iron frying pan to medium/high heat. You want your butter to melt and bubble, but not to turn brown and burn. Put enough butter in the pan so that the entire bottom has a coating of melted butter.

5. Spoon the batter into blobs on the griddle. You can gently smooth out the tops and spread the batter slightly.

6. Cook each side of the johnnycake for ~2-3 minutes. They cook fairly fast.

And that’s it! They’re super easy.

They won’t be as fluffy and nice as a buttermilk pancake, but they are hearty, savory, buttery, and I could eat them plain. I just love the texture of the cornmeal. It’s a very simple food that can be used in so many ways. I would recommend trying them like pancakes, as a dipper for soups and chili, or as a base for huevos rancheros (in place of a corn tortilla). Enjoy!