Pouring snow inspired this cozy dinner of cornbread, beans, and greens, a favorite combo in
these parts and for most of the south.
Preheat your oven and start mixing. This cornbread is slightly sweet and buttery rich. And heating the oiled cornbread pan before pouring in the batter is a must – if you are a crunchy crust lover. We fight over the end pieces because we all love crust. See the recipe HERE.
Round here, I always start off beans by sautéing onions and peppers, so I ransacked the freezer for the roasted sweet Italian peppers that I bought last fall from Mountain Harvest Organic Farm (Julie and Carl sell at the North Asheville and Waynesville Tailgate Markets). I was craving pinto beans, but had to settle for black beans since a trip to the store was out of the question. I was also out of a very essential ingredient for beans – bay leaves, so I added a pinch of cocoa and cinnamon (I only add this to black beans), and some garlic.
Onions and olive oil were the base for the kale too. Gotta have some grease to make it good, right? The beans and greens were vegan by chance, but the grease (olive oil in this case) in both dishes is essential for that satisfied feeling.
At the table we broke open Matt Timmer’s pepper vinegar for the greens. SO fantastico! Thank you Matt. Matt grows lots of peppers in his garden, mostly really fiery peppers, and shares a variety of addictive homemade salsa with us at work.
Dinner was a great combo. Plus, guess what we’re having for breakfast? Toasted cornbread with maple syrup and yogurt. Uh-huh! Happy snow day people!
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Hey there Ruth! So glad to see you celebrating the snow days! Thanks for the cornbread shout-out–sooo important! (Not to leave out the beans and greens–also soooo important!)
Linda
Hope you not TOO deep in snow on Rogue Harbor Farm!