Cornbread Omelets – and the treacherous adventure of being me :)
I had planned on this being a prettier post photography wise but I ended up needing to run to my doctor’s office and get some stitches in my head about halfway in (More on that later).
So this morning I was faced with the option of writing it using the photos I had or re-doing the entire thing – and I really didn’t want to rephotograph it- so I decided to take Tammy Warr’s advice on Facebook when she said “Girl, just roll with it…. Time is too precious to waste it worrying over the small stuff…. You can’t un-ring a bell and none of us expect perfection anyway. Just think of everything else you could be doing to enjoy today rather than worrying about the pictures for your post…. “
I thought of deadlines I needed to meet and having time to write this week’s email newsletter. I thought of drinking just one more diet dr pepper while I looked out to watch the squirrels get into mischief in my back yard. Did I mention my squirrels?
We have tons of them here. They’re pretty bold, too, sunning on our back deck.
My kids have named them all Henry.
When people come and eat in our sun room they will always inevitably comment on the Henry’s and y’all know how I like to mess with people, right?
So I got this sign and put it right on the door leading out to where the squirrels play.
~giggle~
I’ve had a good bit of fun with that one.
Okay so on to my post. This past weekend while I was at the National Cornbread Festival, I got to try a cornbread omelet. It didn’t sound all that good at the start but my curiosity was piqued and I was won over at first bite!
If you like omelets with all the goodies inside and you love that delicate crispness around the crust of cornbread, you’ve just met your new best friend (that’d be me–or this omelet). This is a great way to throw together a quick supper or lunch and you can use whatever you have on hand as filling options. It also cooks up in just a few minutes.
Oh and it’s good. I mentioned that, right? Yup, I got to eat a few bites of this one before I headed off to my doctor, but we’ll get into that later in the post. Let’s get cooking!
You’re gonna need: Milk, egg, a little bit of vegetable oil, and self rising corn meal mix.
If you follow me through this entire post, you’ll soon need:
A. Stoneware plate on a shelf about six feet or so up in the air
B. A towel to stem the blood flow of your newly acquired head wound
C. A cell phone
D. A family doctor
E. Car keys and a baseball cap so you don’t freak people out driving down the highway.
But we’re not to that part yet so let’s just focus on the cornbread ingredients.
For the filling, use whatever you like in your omelets or whatever you have on hand.
Veggies, leftover ham, turkey, chicken, anything will do.
I’m using some frozen pepper and onion blend and bacon.
The only thing you really need for your filling is *cheese* because that is what holds this whole shenanigan together.
Place all of your cornbread batter ingredients in a bowl.
Mix that up well.
Basically this is just a thin cornbread batter, kind of the consistency of pancake batter.
So the problem is that at this point I decided to go look through my prop closet and find the plate and table linens that I wanted to photograph this with.
For me, food photography just seems a little silly. I understand fully the need for it and the benefit of it, but I have always felt it was silly with regards to my cooking because I’m cooking to feed people, not to dazzle them with how pretty something is once it’s cooked. That’s just not my thing. Cooking is far too practical to me.
I should have gone with my gut on that.
As I was looking through a pile of linens in the bottom of the closet, a stoneware plate on the top shelf, about six feet above my head, got curious and wanted to see what I was up to (My friend Jason pointed out that the irony in this is that I was attacked by a Southern plate 
.
A stack of plates fell down on my head and I just took a deep breath and sat there a minute thinking “Okay, that hurt.”
It didn’t stop hurting so I lowered my head and pressed the part that was smarting into the carpet for a few seconds, waiting on it to pass. When I lifted my head, I saw that I was going to have to now clean up the plates and the carpet as well. That’s when I noticed a broken stoneware plate on the floor beside me. My first thought was “Crud. I gotta clean the carpet.”
I had put my veggies in to sauté a bit and forgot about them so I grabbed a towel, pressed it to my head, and hurried into the kitchen to take the very blurry picture below…
So please pretend this is a clear picture. I mean, hey, it’s peppers and onions in a skillet. Good enough to demonstrate that, right?
Take a small nonstick pan and sauté your filling ingredients. I sprayed mine with nonstick cooking spray but you can use a pat of butter or a wee bit of oil if you’d like to cook them in or if your pan isn’t as nonstick as you’d like for it to be.
Cook this over medium to medium high heat until veggies are just tender.
Set your veggies aside and then spray the pan again with cooking spray, or add a tablespoon of butter or oil to it.
Place pan over medium heat again. If you opted for butter or oil, let it heat up a minute or two.
Balance a towel on your head so you can use both hands to take this shot and go ahead and call your friend Jyl on speakerphone because she used to be a paramedic. When she answers, give her a minute to stop laughing after you say “So not all head wounds end up needing stitches, right?”
Go into the bathroom and take the photo she requested and send it to her and wait for her to call back laughing harder.
We’re really good friends that way.
Pour a very thin layer of batter into the bottom of the skillet and immediate tilt your skillet all around a it in order to spread it out over the whole bottom. Cook for a minute or two, until bubbles form on top and the bottom is browned.
Bite the bullet and call and leave a message for your doctor because you know if you go to the hospital in your town it will end up taking all day, possibly two, and even then you’re not guaranteed medical treatment (Been there, done that).
Then flip.
Cook this for a minute or so until it lightly browns on the bottom.
Flip it over again and add in your filings, beginning with cheese and ending with cheese.
Answer your phone when the doctor calls back and tells you that you definitely need to come into the office. Tell him you’ll be right there and then hurry and finish up the omelet because you’ve gotten this far and you’re kinda hungry and don’t know how long you’ll be gone…
Flip that over and let it cook just until the cheese begins to melt.
Take a quick photo, take a quick bite, and head to the doctor.
Managing all of this and still being back home in time to take a shower, fix your hair so the stitches don’t show, and cook supper = pretty cool.
Seeing the look of surprise on your husband’s face when you answer his question of ”What did you do today?” = Priceless.
Ingredients
- 1 Cup Self Rising Corn Meal Mix
- 1 Cup Milk
- 1 Egg
- 2 Tablespoons Oil
- 2 Cups cheddar cheese
- 2-3 Cups of Filling ingredients of your choice (onions, bell peppers, mushrooms, cooked bacon, cooked ham, cooked chicken, etc)
Instructions
- Place small omelet skillet over medium heat.
- In a medium mixing bowl, place milk, egg, oil, and corn meal mix. Stir until well combined and smooth.
- Add filling ingredients to your skillet and sauté until tender. Remove from skillet and wipe skillet out before returning to stove eye. Spray skillet again with nonstick cooking spray or add a tablespoon of oil or butter. Allow to heat. Pour a thin layer of cornbread batter into skillet, tilting skillet around until it coats the bottom. Cook until top is bubbled and bottom is browned. Flip and cook until just lightly browned on the other side. Top omelet with 1/4 cup of cheese, 1/2 cup filling ingredients, and another 1/4 cup cheese. Fold over and press down lightly with spatula to help seal. Cook just until cheese begins to melt. Remove to plate and make remaining omelets.
Print This Recipe
“I’ve always thought that a big laugh is a really loud noise from the
soul saying, ‘Ain’t that the truth.’”
~Quincy Jones
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Posted by Christy Jordan
on May 3 2012. Filed under Main Course, Quick&Easy.
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Above and beyond the call of duty, Christy! My first reaction would have been irritation at having to clean the carpet, too. And here’s a lesson for us all: put the heavy dishes on the BOTTOM shelf. Put the light linens on the TOP shelf. If the linens fall on you, you just have to refold them, not remove stains from the carpet. Glad you are on the mend!
Where were you when my husband set that closet up ? lol Sounds like we need you and your wisdom for a visit! Hey, at least we’re both practical with the carpet, right?
Gratefully,
Christy
Must be a southern thing…about the cornbread, I mean. Never thought about using it in this way….bet it would make a GREAT pinto bean, onion, cheese and ham omlete! Sorry about your head!! LOVE your site and receipes! PJ (Rogersville, AL)
Oh your omelet sounds DIVINE! Thank you so much! You know my whole family is out your way!
Gratefully,
Christy
Oh my gosh, it sounds like something that would happen to me!! So sorry about your incident. I was running from the sprinkler one day and ran into a tree branch. It hurt like you know what. I asked my husband to look at it, and he said we need to take you to the emergency room. I didn’t see it, so I didn’t know the severity of the wound. We get to the emergency room. They want to know if he has done something to me. I said no, I’m clumsy, I did it to myself. We’re in the waiting room and there is some unhappy guy in there ranting about the doctors at this hospital. His poor wife is sitting there mortified. She was the one who had been in the hospital. When the nurse comes in to see if it would be all right to see the ranting man first, we said of course, take him on back! Finally I get to see the doc. I had 4 tiny stitches in my ear. But the worst part was you could see gristle. Yuk. My nephew, who is a PA ,said that if I ever needed to go to the emergency room again, just tell them you are having chest pains and they will take you right away.
Eep! We are definitely kindred spirits! I’m trying to be so so so careful today because I feel like a broken bone is next! Good idea on the hospital! A good veterinarian also works in a pinch (as opposed to many hospitals)!
Gratefully,
Christy
My kid sister, long gone now, thought all grasshoppers were named Edward. Thanks for the memory!
Oh how very sweet Nanci! Made my heart smile.
Christy, glad you are on the mend. Your squirrels are cute… the only reason they are so brave is they “Know a Great Cook when they See one.” They are just hoping for some free taste testing.
MM (Celina, TX)
Aww M, you made me blush! Thank you for your sweet sweet kindness today!
Gratefully,
Christy
CHRISTY!! WATCH OUT!!! THERE IS A HOMICIDAL TURQUOISE SNOWFLAKE PYREX BOWL BEHIND YOU AND IT LOOKS TICKED!!!!
hehehe…
~snickers and shoots diet dr pepper out her nose ~
I am glad you are okay and can laugh about it. I had a crockpot fall on my head once. I didn’t need stitches, but I did need a new crockpot. My husband teased me unmercifully about being so hard headed that I would break a crockpot.
Ouch, that hurt to even thing about! Every time I open a cabinet today and see something at head level it makes my head hurt more! lol
ooooh, this would be good with a little of Momma’s tuna salad and chow -chow in the middle!
Now you’re talkin’!
I have lots of squirrels also and we fight over the pecans when they start falling. Then! They take the pecans they steal and sit on my deck looking in my kitchen window eating away! I think I have the ultimate weapon this year. Just adopted a rescue cat who now sits inside looking out the window and caught her nose to nose hissing at a squirrel yesterday. Squirrel didn’t look too happy about change of events! All my king snakes that keep away the poison ones are called Herman.
We have two enormous pecan trees. Have lived here three years now and got two pecans, but the squirrels are fat and happy!
Love you Cheryl!
Christy
Those look like what my Mom called “johnny cakes” – and they look great with all the omelet fixings!!! I was just thinking that if it was a thinner batter you could call it a Southern Crepe!!!
You are certainly a kindred spirit – I tend to do things like that all the time – usually it’s a little bruise (along with a bruised ego!!!).
I had an iron to fall on my head, I didn’t need stitches but I sure needed a pain reliever!! I love your attitude..and thanks for giving me a little laugh of the day.
“Cook this over medium to medium high head until veggies are just tender. ”
Honey, are you *sure* you don’t need X-rays?
LOL!!!
If I don’t have self-rising corn meal (& obviously I don’t), can I adapt your recipe for self-rising flour?
Hope you heal quickly!
We’ll definitely try this, but with a football helmet on our heads, and steel toe boots.
Great story, and I’m making this for lunch!
I am thinking I always have leftover taco meat and seem to run out of tortillas way too much so now I have a solution I will make taco omelets…
I love when you write stories like this. I cannot believe you finished the omelet AND took a picture before going to the doctor. Actually, sounds like something I would do also.
I make a lot of omelets but never thought of doing a cornbread omelet. I will be trying this…putting cornmeal mix on the grocery list.
Take good care of YOU!
So thankful for your vulnerability and the enCOURAGEment it always gives the rest of us HUMANS!! We love you, Christy!
This is what I posted on my Facebook page this morning: “Wanna know what really hurts?? When you’re vacuuming and you’ve got the extended wand in one hand and you’re standing in a chair and you bend down to turn the vacuum off with the empty hand but the hand with the metal wand goes up to balance you, hits the ceiling fan and then flies like a baseball right into your mouth. That’s what hurts. And I know this from personal experience.”
It’s not the normal things that we always try to save ourselves from that will kill us…it’s always the freaky, I-would-never-have-thought-of-that-in-a-million-years things that will.
The upside is that for at least a couple of days I will need no collagen injections for my lips. Angelina Jolie’s got nothing on me!! Hopefully it will go down by the time we’re taking pictures for my son’s First Holy Communion on Sunday!
And I hope you’re feeling better soon too!!! Take care of yourself!!
I’m thinkin’ that’s breakfast tomorrow…with a little bbq pulled pork tossed in!
Thanks Christy!
-Perry
Awww Christy ~ Bless your heart! You *are* okay, right? No concussion? Thanks for being such a trooper and bringing us a great new recipe in spite of your war wounds. And great story to go with the omelet. ;->
Oh girl! Been there done that! Way toooooo many times! Glad you are okay… well… you know what I mean. LOL!
Southern Crepe is exactly what I thought when I saw you swirling it around in the pan! Looks yummy! With all kinds of possibilities! I like that!
By the way, what is corn meal mix? Just that it is self-rising, or is it something in particular?
Christy, I’m not sure I’ve ever seen self-rising corn meal. Don’t you have a recipe for it?
If not, where in California would I find it???
Thanks a bunch!
Try adding 1 tablespoon baking powder and 1/2 teaspoon salt to regular corn meal
Thank you, sweet one! ♥
Awwww, Momma has a boo-boo. So sorry Christie – but of course you turned it into a smile for the rest of us! The world would be a better place if we all had your attitude. (Doesn’t everyone name their squirrels?)
Hey Christy! I’m from Calif. & we’d call that a Southern Taco! Glad you weren’t badly hurt by your “Southern Plate”! Love you Girl!
When my daughter and husband had their new house built (after the fire that completely destroyed the old one) she decided to have the kitchen cabinets and counters built a little high to accommodate her family whose heights range from 5 ft9 (her) to 6 ft 4 (youngest of three boys. Just happens that the bottoms of the upper cabinet doors come to my forehead. Need I say more? I must remember when I’m using the cabinets to shut the doors as I go. Did I mention that I’m the runt of the llitter checking in at 5 ft. 2? Sorry to hear of your close encounter with the dishes and glad it wasn’t any worse.
I now have a what everybody tells me is a Harry Potter lightening bolt shaped scar on the top of my head from falling down concrete steps this past Valentines Day at the senior night basketball game. The ER doc asked how many steps I fell down, I told him 4 or 5. He says no, the report we got from the witnesses was it was 8 or 9. My reply – I didn’t say I hit them ALL on the way down, at some point I was mid air. Luckliy it was very dark on the drive to the ER, and all those waiting in line backed away when I got out of our truck.
My husband too, missed the excitement. He was actually waiting for me in the truck to come on out of the gym and getting extremely agitated because he thought I was personally talking to everyone there before I left – not know I was bleeding all over the place after doing my best to stick the landing.
He did allow as how he would prefer that I not color my hair red, it just does not look good on me, stick with the bleach blonde.
Ouch! Your poor head, darlin’! I hope it feels better very soon. As for the cornbread omelet — that looks and sound delicious! I’m gonna make them this weekend for dinner and fill them with taco meat, salsa, and cheese.
Need to find self-rising cornmeal mix…
The creativity of this post of disaster is just like you, Christy! The squirrels are adorable. I say the blurry sauteed peppers photo is just an action shot!
Glad you are okay.
Love and hugs!
See…just proves my theory…MOST hardheaded women in the South can take a “plate licking”, go get some stiches, and STILL get supper on the table! (Our crawdads up here in our Kentucky creek are all named “Steve”. lol)
Sounds great and planning on fixing it either this afternoon or tomorrow. I love cornbread. My husband and I came to the Cornbread festival last Saturday but I didn’t get a chance to meet you. (Would have loved to though). It was our first visit.
Now – where is the picture of your head injury? I would love to see your husband’s face.
You’re too funny! Omelet looks great though!
Hi Christy,
Sure glad you are alright. I like your thought on food photos. Interesting omelet, but it does sound good.
This one was really hard. I have this horrible thing where I laugh at head wounds involuntarily so it was compounded by the story behind it. If I were not posting to my good proper friend’s Christy’s blog I would say that sounds like some stupid sh…er stuff I would do. I saw a movie one time where a guy was carrying a big double armful of rakes and shovels and other make shift Zombie killing tools when the elevator doors opened. He leaned in to see the doors led down to a long fall with no elevator. He turned to get out and keep from falling only to have all the rakes and such hit the door and make him fall down the shaft. I am quite sure that will happen to me one day. lol
Christy, I think you and I just might be related! Maybe you’re a long-lost daughter I didn’t know about. You sound so much like me….a younger version anyway. I’ve only been following your site since Saturday, after I saw you on a re-run Paula Deen Best Dishes show, and have wished that I had heard of you a lot sooner! Everything you say and do just falls right in line with the things in my life. Oh, and that accent that Paula and Bobby made fun of…..even though you’re from Alabama and I’m from Texas, I didn’t hear any accent! They were the ones that talked funny. Good luck to you, and keep up the good work.
Oh, and sorry about your accident. Glad you’re OK. You sure one of the Henrys didn’t climb up there and PUSH those plates down on you?
Being a Texas gal, I like the bottom of the cornbread so much, I would flip it over in the black cast-iron skillent so the top and bottom both are crunchy! My husband (South Dakota boy – believe me, it ain’t anything like South Carolina), hated it when I did that because he likes the soft part so now I eat the bottoms and he eats the tops! But I would LOVE this omelet. He is out of town today so I know what I’m having for supper! I really love your recipes and posts. Keep up the good work and watch out for the hateful stoneware dishes!
This looks like an omelet even I can do! So sorry about the stit
ches. Love your blog soooo much.
Oh, and I forgot to mention that I’m a quilter too.
Glad you are ok. We would starve without your recipes!!! LOL How many stitches?
Thank you! I’m not sure. I thought there were five but when I got to looking at it this morning I realized that the cut is an L shape and the five I counted were on the smaller part of the “L”, lol! Either way, I’m put together again!
The landscaping at my workplace is overrun with robins, all named Steve, and finches, all named Edie. After evicting a squirrel from my kitchen one winter’s morning, before I’d had a chance to put on any clothes or, more importantly, have any coffee, all those evil little rats-with-good-PR have names I can’t repeat here, because this is a family place, and I wouldn’t want to sully it with dirty words!
Get well soon! Keep your stitches dry! (And, if you’re on better terms with your vet than with your doctor, like I am, the vet will probably be happy to take out the stitches for you.)
Got to try this. BBQ restaurant we went to outside Nashville uses the cornbread pancake with the shredded meat and slaw to make a BBQ taco. So this is going to be handy in more ways than one.
Take care and hope your boo-boo heals quick!!
Christy! You poor thing! I know you have got one heck of a headache! I am still laughing about the “Southern plate …”
Hydrogen peroxide will help get that blood out of the carpet!
Oh no! I hope you’re ok!
Cornbread omelets sounds fantastic, and I couldn’t agree with you more about food photography. I struggle with it on a daily basis, and I get mad at myself for letting it get to me so much. It robs my happiness daily.
Anyway, glad you’re ok! Be a little more careful now, ok?
Several years ago, I walked in the door after grocery shopping to a ringing phone. Mama was calling to tell me my granny was in the hospital. It was so unexpected and sounded so urgent, I lost all my sense right then and there. I spun around and went to take off out the back door and tripped over a grocery bag full of canned goods (I’d set it down trying to hurry after the phone, you know?) and tumped forward and slapped my whole face against the doorjamb! It hurt like the dickens!! I shook it off, laughed at myself, put away my cold goods and went flying out the door again and somehow managed to hook a toe on the threshold and down I went – I hit every single one of the five steps with some part of my body and ended up with my face planted in the grass. I picked the sod out of my glasses and hair as hubby drove me to the hospital. When I got there, i ran in to find mama in the waiting room and she said, “GOOD LORD! What has happened to you, shild?” I hadn’t bothered to look at myself, but when i did – what a mess! A vertical crease startign to bruise up fromthe doorjamb, dirt, grass and snarled hair and a big swollen goosegg on my shinbone! LOL The nurse made me see a doctor before i coudl even go in and see granny!
Girl you are lucky those heavy plates didn’t kill you! I can’t wait to try the cornbread omelet tho!
Sorry to hear about your accident but I enjoyed your exchange with your best friend about the need for stitches…I was fully expecting a picture of your injury. I’m amazed at your sense of duty finishing the dish before running to the doctor. I surely can imagine the look in your husband’s face coming home because I suspect it’s the same one my Mom gave me when she came home one day many years ago and found me wrapped in bandages after a car accident.
My oh my, I fixed this tonight and it was awesome!!! I have to order my cornmeal from Alabama because the “cornmeal” out here is NOT cornmeal!! I made mine by saute the veggies with a sausage patty and then scrambled an egg in this before putting in the cheese and onto the cornmeal and it truly was delicious!!! Thank you sooo much for all of your wonderful recipes – I live in Wyoming (35 years) but from Ky originally so love your southern foods and ways!!!!
Are you talking about corn muffin type mix or plain self rising cornmeal?
Yeah, always heavy stuff on the bottom, why do we all automatically put heavy stuff we rarely use up high? Hope your head is better, head wounds just bleed so much!
Hi Christy! I got tickled when I looked at this pic (and of course, by the story and the squirrels) because the “omelette” looks so much like something my Mema used to make for me when I spent my summers with her. She called them “ho-cakes” of cornbread. Never filled with anything and cooked like a pancake. Sometimes just thick enough to split and put butter on or just right on top if not thick enough. My Pepa would crumble them into buttermilk and eat like cereal (yuk!). But I cannot find a recipe in her entire collection that even resembles what she used to make! This looks close, so I’m gonna try it (without being filled)! Have you ever heard of anything like that? Or at the Cornbread festival? (oh..and I hope your head heals quickly)
Christy, I’m so sorry you got hurt, but your storytelling of the incident is hilarious! I can just imagine and see in my mind’s eye how it all went down. Like me a few weeks ago in a restaurant, when the plastic chair I was sitting in collapsed and totally shattered into a million pieces and sent me crashing to the concrete floor. Even though I cracked my tailbone, all I could do was laugh hysterically (after I got through crying) and telling them “I think I broke my butt”. Hope your injury heals fast! Be careful, please!
Oh Julia!!! That is horrifying and hilarious at the same time! I am always getting myself in some kind of mess and all I could do was laugh as well.
Shucks, Christy! I thought the last picture on the post would be of the head wound! That cornbread crepe looked burnt to perfection…hehe.