Corn bread in a Pressure Cooker {Electric Pressure Cooker Recipe}

After last week's experiment with making a yeast type bread in the pressure cooker, I had a few people suggest to try quick breads. So this week I present to you my experiment with corn bread in a pressure cooker using freshly ground popcorn.

Before I start, just a word about popcorn. I love to use ground whole grain popcorn (yes, un-popped) when making corn bread! One of the main reasons is because I like to grind my popcorn really fine into flour rather than corn meal. Before I found this secret, I never enjoyed eating corn bread because the texture was so grainy. Try it. It really does make a difference! Also the ground popcorn has a wonderful fresh flavor that you don't get in corn meal that's been sitting on the shelf for several weeks. It's healthier too because whole grain flours lose nutrients as they sit on the shelf.

So on to cooking corn bread in the pressure cooker. If you don't want to cook it in the pressure cooker or don't have a pressure cooker, here's my instructions for cooking it in the oven.

Corn Bread {Electric Pressure Cooker Recipe}

Printable Recipe

*Makes 8 servings

INGREDIENTS:

1 Cup milk

¼ Cup butter, melted

1 large egg

1-1/4 Cup cornmeal (made with fine freshly ground popcorn)

1 Cup white flour *see note

½ Cup sugar

1 Tbsp. baking powder

½ tsp. salt

DIRECTIONS:

Add 2 Cups of water and a splash of white vinegar to the empty pressure cooker. I've found that adding the vinegar to the water helps so you don't develop a white film around your pressure cooker pan when you cook. Place the metal trivet on the bottom. Then spray a round pan that fits into the electric pressure cooker with oil. 

Beat milk, butter and egg in large bowl. Stir in remaining ingredients all at once just until flour is moistened (batter will be lumpy). Pour batter into round pan. Wrap pan with aluminum foil. Fold a 1-1/2 to 2 foot piece of aluminum foil into thirds and use that to carry the pan in and out of the pressure cooker (See my pressure cooker bread post for an example of this). Pressure on high pressure for 16 minutes. Naturally release the pressure. Serve warm.

*Note: alternatively you can try it with a whole-grain flour. I've made it with wonder flour before and it it's really tasty, just a bit more crumbly than with white flour.

Reactions & thoughts on pressure cooking cornbread: 
It tasted delicious! My oldest son said I should make it this way every time, he loved it. In fact he even asked for some today in his lunch. The pressure cooker made it very moist inside.

There wasn't a whole lot of time savings. I tried to cut the time to 12 minutes the first time I made it and it was still raw inside. The second time I did 16 minutes and it came out perfectly done. In the oven it takes about 20-25 minutes so if you count time for the pressure cooker to heat up and cool down, you're not saving much time.

It wasn't the prettiest thing in the world. I covered it with aluminum foil and it stuck a little so next time I either need to spray the foil or try it uncovered.

Well, I'm on the fence a little on this one. I haven't decided which way I'll be cooking corn bread in the future...in the oven or in the pressure cooker. What do you think? Have you tried making corn bread in the pressure cooker? Got any tips for me? What works for you? Do you think it's worth it? Got a better recipe for me to try?

For more pressure cooker recipes see my pressure cooker recipe page. Or follow my pressure cooker board on pinterest.