Saturday, October 29, 2011

SWISS STYLE CORNBREAD


Yah,you-betcha! As if Swatches, Victorinox and Ricola weren't enough. Courtesy of Chateau Gruyere and Clausen's Sauerkraut a new star shines on the crown of The Anaglyphic Pone King tonight. Cornbread has now officially been Swiss-stylized.

I was a little bummed out at having no baby pictures for this batch, cause it really did have some photogenic ingredients. Fresh ears of white corn, a pair of almost purple red onions, and the slab of cheese nearly the color of the Chateau Gruyere. Add to that the bacon, buttermilk, sauerkraut, eggs, creamed-corn,and cornmeal and you've got quite a crowd going on the stove.

 Yeah, that's how there came to be no baby pix. I was a little scatterbrained, and had to back up and go down the  list and see what was missing more than once. First, the fresh corn grated off the cob didn't look like the 15oz of cream style corn I usually use. To keep from coming up short in the mini-loaf pans, I added half a can of creamed-white-corn and things looked better.

From experience I expected the bacon to make a flavorful but heavy corn bread. With that in mind, I made only one pan with bacon and bacon drippings. The other used only corn oil. Granted the sauerkraut could hold it's own with bacon, but the chances are the Gruyere would be pushed into the background. Keeping the oil straight was a little picky but not hard.

 In the pans the batter still didn't seem quite right to me. I ran down the list in my head, and got to sauerkraut before I noticed I hadn't opened it yet. I put 3/4cup or so onto a plate. I squeezed it into a narrow row, and cut it short with a knife. Then after squeezing the juice out and fluffing it back up, I added the kraut to the mini-loaf pans at the same the half-a-pound of crumbled crispy bacon and 4oz of grated Gruyere were getting added.



Gruyere is a harder cheese and doesn't bake the same as cheddar or Swiss. The pieces seem to hold together even in baking and give a "noisey" surface. Well there's no recipe card yet, but this story needed to get told. I reckon I can get back to the card, and maybe even an ingredient picture. No hurry. Like I told my wife, "It's hardly delicious at all."













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