If you like biscuits, you’re guaranteed to love this rare but delectable recipe for southern hoe cake.
Hoe cake (also known as Johnny cakes) seems to be a rather elusive recipe, even among southerners. Apart from my own, I have only one friend whose family still makes it. Even among us though, the variations are vast. His family makes their cornmeal hoe cakes using cornmeal and buttermilk, as seems to be the custom among recipes found on the web. While this style of generally resembles a , a is typically fluffier and doesn’t include . Meanwhile, my family’s version uses flour and produces a bread that looks like buttermilk biscuits, but with a lighter and fluffier texture and crispy coating.
Either way you look at it, hoe cake is revered by those who know of it. I am sure its origin sprang forth much like the rest of our classic southern dishes – too little time and too few ingredients. While it is a simple food to make, it will easily take over the starring role at your dinner table.
I can honestly say that this is a rare recipe for hoe cakes, having searched and not found it anywhere online. I do hope you will try it and guarantee that if you like biscuits, you’ll love our southern hoe cake recipe.
Recipe ingredients
Recipe ingredients- Self-rising flour. If you don’t have self rising flour where you are, go here for the formula of how to make your own.
- Vegetable shortening
- Whole milk
Combine two cups of self-rising flour and 1/2 cup of shortening in a .
Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Pour a thin layer of vegetable oil into the bottom of a cake pan.
This is where the old folks use a cast iron skillet like you would make cornbread. However, at the time of this tutorial, Mama had yet to hand down a cast iron skillet to me so I figured a cake pan with a wee bit of wear on it is just as good. Either way, you’re going to add enough oil to cover the bottom of your cake pan and then stick it in the oven while it preheats.
Add one cup of milk to your and stir with a spoon until all wet.
It should look like this.
You can add about a quarter of a cup more of milk if need be, but what we are aiming for here is soupy biscuit batter.
All that brown is the crispy bread. This is SO GOOD!
Cut it any way you choose, add some apple butter and dig in!
Recipe Notes
- If you want to make this southern hoe cake a savory side dish like , you can easily add in jalapenos, grated cheese, or chopped fried bacon with a drop of .
Storage
- If you have leftovers, store them in an airtight container in the fridge for up to four days.
- Otherwise, you can freeze hoe cake in a sealed container or bag for up to three months.
- When you need to reheat the hoe cake, it’s best to place the slices on a baking sheet in a 350-degree oven for five to 10 minutes.
Recipe FAQs
What do you serve with hoe cake?
Serve your hoe cake as a side dish with maple syrup, apple butter, or butter with a drizzle of honey or sprinkle of sugar. It tastes best accompanying your favorite Southern-style main meal. I recommend fried chicken, chicken and gravy (use the hoe cake to soak up the gravy, yum), North Alabama-style pulled BBQ chicken, or pork chops.
Where does the name hoe cake come from?
Just like there are a few variations of hoe cake recipes, there are some variations in the explanation of how it got its name. It appears to have first been recognized in print in 1745, according to the Oxford Dictionary. But others have pointed out that the term hoe was used for cooking and it was similar to a griddle. And that my friends seems to be where the term hoe cake (or should it be ?) got its name.
Can you make hoe cake gluten-free?
Yes, you can easily make this southern hoe cake recipe gluten-free. Just simply use gluten-free self-rising flour instead and follow the below instructions.
Ingredients
- 2 cups self-rising flour
- 1 cup milk
- 1/2 cup vegetable shortening
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425. Pour a thin layer of oil to cover the bottom of an eight-inch round cake pan and place it in the oven to heat.
- Cut shortening into the flour well. Pour milk in and stir until wet.
- Pour into the well-heated pan and bake for fifteen to twenty minutes or until browned.
- Invert onto plate.
Video
Nutrition
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Thank you so much Leftover Queen!! I am THRILLED that you stopped by my blog! It is divine….but looks like I’m going to have to do a little explaining on apple butter to folks who haven’t heard of it! Hehe! I have thought about making more and mailing samples out via USPS…….
Finally someone that knows what a real hoe cake is.
thank you so much for your comment 🙂
That looks so easy! When it’s finished baking, is the texture more corn breadish or biscuity? And would it be good to smush up into a big bowl of collard greens or black-eyed peas?
LOL at your reply. unless you’re a Yankee, cornbread goes with peas n greens. biscuits and hoecokes go with eggs, bacon, ham, fried chicken, food like that.
My mom made something like this but she would put home cured bacon in it.
I like mine with Southeast pulled pork and brunswick stew.
that sounds like a great combination!
I see you asked your question last year but I would still like to reply in case you didn’t try it. This Hoe Cake is like a biscuit and very good. We use buttermilk in place of whole milk because we just like the taste and texture better. I live in South Mississippi and it’s good with peas. If 2-3 people are eating I cut the recipe in half.
I was skeptical of this recipe, but I longed for the taste of a hoe cake like my grandmother used to make for me for breakfast. So I tried it & I’m glad I did! I will make it again, with a few variations. I made it just as suggested in the above recipe. Next time I will, put a pinch of salt in the batter & I will bake it on top of the stove in my cast iron skillet. My grandmother made hers on top of the stove. The one I made didn’t bake through enough for me and I let it stay in the oven probably 45-50 min. It did have most attributes of my grandmothers though.
YES, my grandmother made it on top of stove in cast iron pan !!!!
yes my grandmother also did it that way i have been looking for this about 30 years ask anybody now they have never heard of it …this is my best day ever here i come memery lane loved my grandmother.. she also made a thing she called milkoast does anyone know that ..it was toast sitting in a bowel of warm mike
So happy to hear you found it and it connects with your grandmother! My Grandmama used to make milk toast too. She added a bit of cinnamon and sugar too it. Mmm, mmm! Thank you so much for your 5 star rating. Appreciate you 🙂
I grew up in Virginia and this is the hoecake we ate.
Ummmmm!
This is more of a biscuit with a crispy outer
Wow, the hoe cakes my great granny made were slightly crisp and slightly chewy on the outside, moist and tender on the inside. Cooked on top of the stove in a cast iron skillet. Where we lived in Florida there was a mill that produced stone ground corn meal in several grinds coarse (like grits) or fine like flour. We used the fine grind with small amount of all purpose flour and a pinch of salt. Just enough hot water to make a shapeable dough. You heated your skillet and greased it well and patted the hoe cake into the pan. Turn the heat to low and check ever so often. It took at least a hour to cook. Turn over by putting your hand on top and flipped the bread onto your hand and replaced it with the uncooked side down. When it was finished it was white ( white cornmeal) around the edge with yellow/brown beginning about a 1/2 inch in and black spots in places. It was maybe a half inch thick since it didn’t rise. That was the bread we ate with every meal, really the best with turnip greens. Biscuits were a breakfast food. For us the kind cooked in the oven in oil was cornbread, same recipe, just different cooking method. That one was very crunchy. Cornmeal with eggs and milk was the base for cornbread dressing or thin it out and make griddle cakes – like pancakes, to be served with butter and honey or cane syrup. Just how we did it growing up poor in the Florida sticks
Sounds absolutely wonderful, what precious memories you have!
On most internet recipes, hoe cakes don’t put eggs in it..Why ?
Should I add only flour, shortening, milk & WHY NO EGGS ?
Because you don’t need eggs in this recipe. 🙂 It is essentially a large biscuit. Of course I encourage you to make any of my recipes according to the recipe . Basic Southern biscuits have three ingredients. Give it a try ❤️
My only suggestion…. ADD SALT!
mmm.Hoe cakes! I had my first Hoe Cake at Lady and Sons Restaurant(Paula Deen)!! Yumm!!!
You profile states your blog is new..it looks like its been around for years..packed full of info!I just love it! I love love love southern food, but my butt..not so much!LOL
Thanks for stopping by my blog..I am glad you enjoy it! Stop by anytime!!!!I will be back to yours!!!
Leslie:
Wow, thank YOU for stopping by MY blog!! I love yours and have already subscribed!
Your compliments mean so much! You’ve made my day and I feel like I’m doing something right! YAY!
Been eating ho cakes for 60 years. The only difference between the way you make it and the way I was accustomed to was. We use buttermilk and had a thin bread pan.
Have used milk when I didn’t have buttermilk.
Looks delicious. I love biscuits and this does look like one big biscuit – with apple butter it must be amazing!
Welcome to The Foodie Blogroll!
My aunt use to make hoe cakes in a cast iron skillet and she would sometimes ass chunks of fat back or cracklin to the mixture talk about good and if we as kids at the time ate it plain we would pour syrup over the cakes.Those were the days
Yeah, we added chocolate gravey on it. YUM !!
Ditto on the yum! that sounds delicious!
I have never heard if this. But not being from the south why would I ?? LOL
BUT I think i will try it.
Now I know Those Cast iron are supposed to rock (plus the old add iron to food is great) but I prefer ceramic bake ware myself.
Or stone. I have bought my share of Crappy stoneware. but I have a few loved and abused pieces!
I wonder on this one, if the stoneware would absorb the oil though? Better try it on the glazed ceramic to be safe!
Me, too. I’ve done every imaginable thing to cast iron, and it will rust no matter what I do to it. I threw the iron skillet away.
VisionWare is my fave. Works great!
Well cast iron is the best for hoe cake and the taste is totally different, as is corn bread. my mother made us hoecakes when I was a kid and I am 77 years old and they had been around for a while. I make them once in a great while now. Or up until about 5 years ago when I lost my husband. He liked them, He was mexican and a very good cook himself. He was born and raised here in CA. an I was born and raised in South Carolina. He had never eaten thickened gravey with biscuts an I made them and he loved them. You bet good old southern cooking is soooooo good and my husbands mexican food was so good. (better than the mexican resturants serve) Well good eating folks. Joan
Cast iron rules! The reason it rusts is because you are either putting it away wet OR you are washing it in soapy water, which washes off all the seasoning of the skillet. First, you season it (google it) and second, never wash it again with soap. If food is stuck on it then heat the empty (dirty) skillet past boiling and then add a half cup or so of water to it (as you would to deglaze it) then, while the water is boiling off, scrub the build-up with a wooden spatula. Pour that water out, rinse it, dry it, (remember it may still be very hot) and oil it down. It will not rust, and you will not remove the seasoning … Uncle Charlie