Recipe: Cornmeal and Soured Milk Tea Cakes
Tea Cake with Jelly
Originally uploaded by iasmindecordoba One of the things munenori and I struggle with in the kitchen is our ability to consume milk in a timely fashion. We seem to go through phases where there's not enough or way too much in our fridge. We continue to buy from local dairies when we can, but their smallest containers have a tendency to sour before we can finish the whole jar. We don't want it to go to waste, but we still want to support local initiatives. So, what to do? I've been trying to find a recipe for something that both of us enjoy that you can make with soured milk. Well, I think I've finally found it in this recipe for cornmeal and soured milk tea cakes. The recipe was adapted from one I found online that did things a little differently than I prefer (and with some slightly different ingredients). The original also calls for a gem pan, which I didn't have. Or at least not the cast iron version. I did have a little Wilton rubberized tea cake pan though and that worked remarkably well. There was enough batter to fill the tea cake pan plus two mini muffin pans full. They're best warmed, and we've happily smeared them with fresh cream, butter, and homemade jelly. Enjoy!
The Ingredients
- 4 tablespoons duck or chicken fat (alternately, bacon grease or vegetable shortening), melted
- 2/3 cup sugar
- 1 cup cornmeal
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 large eggs
- 1-1/2 cups soured milk
- 1 teaspoon lemon extract
- Pre-heat the oven to 350F.
- Melt the fat until liquefied, then set aside briefly.
- Combine dry ingredients in a bowl and whisk until combined.
- Add the eggs, the soured milk, and the lemon extract to the dry ingredients and mix until just combined and wet (batter may appear slightly lumpy).
- Add the fat and combine, mixing until batter loses most large lumps, taking care not to overmix.
- While the batter is resting, grease or coat with cooking spray, a gem pan or a several mini muffin pans or tea cake pans.
- Fill each slot in the pan 3/4 full with batter, then let rest briefly.
- Place on rack in center of oven and bake 10-15 minutes until tea cakes are light gold and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean (not gluey).
- Remove from oven and let sit on rack slightly until they can be removed from their pans.
- Serve warm with butter and jelly.
If you're using the rubberized pans, you'll likely cook these for 15 minutes rather than 10. I personally like my tea cakes not to brown, just get golden. The mini-muffin tins I used browned up quickly in about 10 minutes, a good 5 minutes before the rubberized pans were quite done. Here's an alternate view of one of the tea cakes just out of the pan, but before cutting.