Abanian Cornbread with Feta and Green Onion
Serves 6-8
The cheese and green onion make this cornbread unique. Dense and flavorful, the cornbread makes a great accompaniment to stews.
Ingredients:
1-1/2 cups cornmeal
16 ounces cottage cheese
4 eggs
1 cup chopped scallions, plus 1 Tbsp for garnish
1/2 cup butter (1 stick), melted
1/4 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp thyme
4 ounces feta cheese, chunked
1/4 tsp salt
Method:
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Grease an 8″ square casserole.
2. In a large bowl, combine all ingredients (cornmeal, cottage cheese, eggs, scallions, melted butter, paprika, thyme, feta, and salt.
3. Pour into prepared casserole and spread evenly.
4. Bake at 400F until lightly browned and an inserted toothpick comes out clean, about 35 minutes.
5. Garnish with remaining scallions. Serve warm.
NOTE: This dish was excellent warm, but dries out quickly. On 3/27/12 I adjusted the recipe for more moisture. The first time we gave the little we had leftover to the birds. After the adjustments, even leftovers were moist and yummy.
Adapted from Home Cooking Around the World, by David Ricketts and Mark Thomas
Thank you for following our Adventure, where I cook a meal from every country in the world, A-Z! Many smiles to you and your family. Love, Sasha
Yummmmmm. This is similiar to Legal Seafood Polenta. They use chopped Jalapenos instead of red pepper.
This recipee sound good I may have to try it, but it’s not the true authentic albanian corn bread. In albania corn bread was peasant food. Cottage cheese and 4 eggs are way too rich ingredients for a poor peasant, esecially during comunism. I gave a good simple recipee that is very close to the original corn bread. I just worked mine so that it maintains moisture when cooled off. Will share with you soon
Sounds great Ketrin! Are you from Albania? I always enjoy authentic insight – it makes this Adventure so much more interesting.
I made this tonioght along with the yoghurt Lamb (you can read about my misadventures on that post). I did have a couple of questions about this recipe though.
The instructions include yoghurt in step #2, but there is no yoghurt in the ingredients. I just used more Cottage cheese since the container I bought was 16 oz. instead of 12 anyway.
Conversely the ingredients list 1/4 tsp of red pepper but it isn’t mentioned in the instructions. I just put it in with everything else.
Thanks for the recipe. We enjoyed this one.
So sorry about this… I’m going to make the recipe again to figure out what happened and will update it with proper proportions. Thank you for letting me know
Ok, I just ate this and I agree with 16 oz of cottage cheese and upped the butter as well! It’s now super moist and yummy. Thanks again for your help!
Maybe could have cooked for only 25-30 min instead of 35? Maybe my oven runs hot, not sure. Ours was okay but a little dried out/hard on top. I tried baking a few in my grandmother’s old, cast iron corn muffin “tin” – the “holes” for the cornbread are shaped like actual corn. I can remember loving her dinners when she made cornbread in those. Sadly, this recipe didn’t fare too well in it. Must have been the heat/duration thing again as they were almost charred and I had to get a knife and massacre them to get them out…
Yes, if you put it in several small containers you’d have to drop the time (so if I made them in muffin tins, I’d check them after 15 minutes, maybe 20). Hope that helps! Your grandmother’s muffin tin sounds awesome – although the size might be even smaller than a muffin.. if so, they’d be done in a flash…