Corn pudding is one of the greatest and most comforting Southern side dishes to ever grace a table. If you're hard up for sides, or tired of the ol' green bean casserole, toss this amazing dish into your Thanksgiving lineup next week. This particular recipe is adapted from Alton Brown's recipe. Basically, I just removed the (based on the end product, unnecessary) bread, and some of the fresh herbs (rosemary and thyme) because I didn't have them.
Here's what you'll need (serves 4-6):

1/2 yellow onion, finely diced
2 tbsp butter
1 14 oz can creamed corn
1 C heavy cream
2 eggs
1/2 C Jiffy corn muffin mix
1 C shredded colby jack cheese
1 tsp kosher salt
fresh ground pepper to taste


Preheat oven to 350°. In a small skillet over medium-high heat, saute onions and herbs in butter until the onions are translucent. In a large bowl, mix the onions with all the other ingredients and stir. Pour into a greased casserole dish, greased muffin tins, or ramekins. Bake the casserole for about 45 minutes or until golden and set. If you're using ramekins or muffin tins, start with 20 minutes and keep checking them until they're soft-set and golden brown on top.

On the way home from the honeymoon, Mr. FvF and I decided to grab dinner in the Charlotte Airport since we had such a long layover before heading back to the Gem. We'd spotted a BBQ place when we caught our connecting flight on the way to Cancun earlier in the week, so we already knew what we'd be having.

It's a good thing I filled up on snacks that I bought at the airport during our flight, because this was pretty disappointing. I ordered the pulled pork, and the Mister had the brisket, each with two sides, a fried pickle and cornbread.

The fried pickle and broccoli cheese casserole were the highlights of my meal. The pork was not only over-sauced, but the sauce was a Carolina-style red that was overwhelming with vinegar. My cole slaw had a shitload of raw onions in it and was bland aside from that. The cornbread was stale and dry. I tried a bite of Mr. FvF's brisket, which was also drenched in the same sauce and registered around "meh" on the taste-o-meter.

The service aspect is pretty much null & void, since it's a food court atmosphere - they just ask what you want and ring it up.

I'd attempted chicken fried steak a while back, and it didn't quite come out the way I planned, so I threw in the towel. Considering it's Mr. FvF's favorite, though, I had to give it another whirl. On the advice of my best gal, the Almighty Lando, I picked up some minute steaks, made a quick egg bath, and tossed some salt, pepper and Mrs. Dash into some flour, and away I went.

All in all, they turned out well, but I encountered a different problem than in my first failure at this dish. Instead of the breading lumping up and coming off all over the place (double dipping is the key there - turn once in the flour mix, once in the eggy bath, then again in the flour), the actually steak started coming apart on me. Only one, though - and I took a picture of that one, because it's the mister's plate and his plate always looks better because it's fuller than mine.

Anyhow, once you have them coated, toss them in a hot, hot cast iron skillet for about 3 minutes on each side, or until the breading browns a bit and gets all crispy and delightful.


The real star of the show, never to be outdone, were the smashed red-skinned garlic rosemary potatoes. Maybe someday I'll be not-lazy enough to tell you how to make those.