Backcountry Cuisine: Brown Beans and Cornbread
Sunday, May 18, 2008 at 10:59AM Brown beans and corn bread are the "national" dish of the Backcountry. There are countless recipes ranging from traditional to juiced-up modern. My recipes are closer to traditional:
Jay's Brown Beans
I highly recommend yellow corn meal, which produces a better flavor than the bleached, white stuff. Stone-ground yellow corn meal is available at most local groceries. A family from Honaker, Virginia, occasionally shows up at fall fairs hereabouts to show off a steam-driven cornmeal mill, using home-grown corn to produce fresh-ground yellow corn meal on the spot. It doesn't get any better than this! I buy two large bags - - one goes in the fridge, the other in the freezer.
A nine-inch cast-iron pan is essential for the cornmeal recipe. Use a cake pan only if you must. I recommend
that you buy a cast-iron pan if you don't already have one; Lodge makes a line of pre-seasoned cast iron ware which saves you the trouble of seasoning the pan yourself. The Lodge line includes a Dutch oven very suitable for the beans.
Traditional accompaniments for brown beans and cornbread are chow-chow or chopped onion. You can serve brown beans without cornbread, but, seriously - - why?

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