Perhaps someone could enlighten me on this question. Is cornflour ( the one you make Cornbread with), the same as Polenta? I don't mean cornstarch, that's the fine white stuff used for thickening sometimes, but cornflour.

Polenta is cornmeal, I've never made cornbread but I presume it's the same stuff.

Yes it's the yellow cornmeal sold as polenta. There are usually 3 grades available, coase medium and fine. The coarse is useful for putting under pizza's etc as it helps them slide off the baking sheet without sticking.
I made cornbread last year and I found it to be rather sweet and a bit 'cakey'. Not that it was horrible or anything but more of a sweet bread or teabread thing than a savory to my taste anyway. Let us know how it turns out.

I've got a fabulous receipe for lime polenta cake :love: but OH doesn't like lime :loopy:

I thought it might be and now I'm sure. I agree mort, cornbread is a bit on the sweet side, but sometimes I get to fancy a batch so I cook one up. I find it very filling and just have it on the side with beans and rice, hoppin' john etc.
I also use cornmeal in a 50/50 dry mix with plain flour to dust fish before frying. Thanks for the info'.

"Hoppin' john" ? :confused:

"Hoppin' john" ? :confused:

I was wondering about that too. Come on Texas tell us all :)

You will need...... 8 oz of Black-eyed peas(beans), a ham hock, medium onion(diced), stick of celery(sliced), couple of cloves of garlic(chopped), can of tomatos, salt,pepper, 4oz longrain rice.
Soak the peas/beans overnight. Trim the fat off the hock, cover with water and bring to boil, skimming off the suds. Cook until tender.
When your hock is done, trim all the meat off the bone and set aside. Drain the beans and cover with fresh water, bring to boil and cook until tender, skim those too. Drain and set aside.
Put a couple of tablespoons of oil into a frying pan and fry up first, the onion, add the garlic, celery and tomatos. Cook until nicely blended. Place the mixture into a 5-6 pint pot (a dutch oven is ideal, or something similar), add the rice, drained beans and 3/4 pint of water. Bring to a simmer,quick stir,and turn down low. Cook for 30 minutes. After 15 minutes add your ham.

This is how I do it at present. Next time I might tweak it a bit. It's an old southern U.S recipe, and I don't know where I got it from, been doing it ages. They say the name 'Hoppin' John' is a corruption of the French 'pois a pigeon'. The 'geon' bit presumably being John.

Sounds tasty I'll give it a go:thumbsup: