Thanksgiving Cranberry Corn Bread

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It will soon be American Thanksgiving, so I thought I’d re-post our Thanksgiving Cranberry Corn bread.  It’s based on the Portuguese Broa style (page 151 in the book)—it’s the regular Master Recipe, but with 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour taken out and replaced with an equal amount of cornmeal.

Here’s what you need to do.  Take about 2 pounds of the Broa dough mentioned above and shape it into a ball; then flatten it with your hands and a rolling pin until it’s about 1/2-inch thick.  Sprinkle the dough with 1/3 of a cup of dried cranberries (or 1/2 cup fresh):

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Now break out your microzester, and use it to scrape the zest from half an orange…

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… now sprinkle that over the cranberries, and then sprinkle a couple of tablespoons of granulated sugar over that…

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Now roll it up like a jelly roll… If it sticks to the board as you’re rolling, nudge it off with a dough scraper.

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Tuck the ends under to form a ball, flatten it on a work surface, and then, using your hands and a rolling pin, make a disk the right size for a 12-inch cast iron pan.  It should be about an inch or inch and a half thick.   If you don’t have a cast-iron pan, see below.**  This instruction applies to this flattened thanksgiving bread only; you can make loaf breads this way too (freeform or in a pan).

Grease the pan well with butter, lard, bacon grease, or oil (I used olive oil today), and place the dough round in it.

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Allow to rest for at least 1 hour and 20 minutes.  You’ll get a more open hole structure if you wait two hours.

Put a broiler tray in the oven to dump water to make steam.  20 minutes before baking time, preheat the oven to 425 degrees F if you keep a baking stone in the oven.  If you don’ t use a stone, a 5-minute pre-heat is adequate (the stone isn’t required since you’ll bake in the cast-iron).

Just before baking, heat the cast-iron pan over medium heat for 1 or 2 minutes to jump-start the baking process and promote caramelization of the bottom crust.  Don’t overdo it–no more than 2 minutes.  It will start to sizzle.

Place the pan on a rack near the center of the oven.  Pour 1 cup of water into the broiler tray and quickly close the oven door.  Depending on the thickness of your loaf and the weight of the pan, baking time will be about 25 minutes.

Carefully turn the hot loaf out of the pan onto a serving plate or cooling rack, or just cut wedges directly out of the pan once it cools.  Be careful with the hot cast-iron pan!

You should get a result just like the cover photo.  Happy Thanksgiving!  Other Thanksgiving recipes:

Stuffing from homemade bread:  https://artisanbreadinfive.com/?p=1228

Thanksgiving buns:  https://artisanbreadinfive.com/?p=443

Thanksgiving Pumpkin Pie Brioche: https://artisanbreadinfive.com/?p=1209

Roasting Your Own Pumpkins: https://artisanbreadinfive.com/?p=50

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** This bread can be done as a simple free-form loaf right on a baking stone, cookie sheet, or silicone mat (about the same baking time, or in a loaf pan (longer baking time needed).  Either way, it’s done at 425 degrees.

1,099 thoughts to “Thanksgiving Cranberry Corn Bread”

  1. Very cool! Will have to try it next year.
    BTW, I saw your book advertised in a KA catalog. You’re really getting out there. Congrats!

  2. Would love a chance at the storage bucket. I already use the flour and the whisk is awesome. But one can’t have to many cooking tools. Love making bread every day! Thanks for a great book!

  3. My friends made bread from this cookbook the other night and it was so delicious! They said the recipes are foolproof, which is exactly what I need. I can’t wait to try making bread without a bread machine.

  4. Excited about Thanksgiving with Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day! I am making three different loaves for the occasion! (Also excited about this giveaway)! Happy Thanksgiving!!

  5. When I first read this I thought Jeff was baking cornbread for the giveaway, and got excited 😉 I bought a 12″ cast iron skillet and a microzester just to make this recipe. It’s quite nice, I’ve made it a few times now and last time I splurged and zested the whole orange (why not).

    I roasted a pumpkin this weekend and am popping my first attempt at the oatmeal pumpkin loaf into the oven right now…fingers crossed…

    Happy Thanksgiving!!!

  6. I have both your books and I’m looking for the best recipe for soft dinner rolls. Maybe Milk and honey raisin in HBI5. Except I would sub cranberries for raisins.

  7. winter is here…thanks for posting about bread needs to rest longer than 45 minutes in my cold house is …trying another loaf tomorrow hoping for even better results on my part wheat/part white loaf.

  8. What a great giveaway! I would have to decide whether to keep it or give it as a gift. Probably keep it 🙂
    That cornbread looks good. I will give it a try.

  9. Why the orange zest? I see people wanting to try cherries. Are there other options people have tried that have been successful. Cornbread is such a staple by itself. This pan fry version does sound yummy. I really need to get back trying this. My first experience with making the breads was a doozy, but I have hope that I’ll get it right eventually.

    1. Debbie: the orange zest really perks up the cranberry, esp when both are sweetened a bit, as I did here. Sounds like you had trouble with a recipe– from which of our books (which page)? We can usually figure out what’s going wrong– also check our FAQs page.

  10. Trial run of the cornbread turned out SUPER. Only buy KAF any more… results are great (this from a ‘newbie’ bread baker of less than a year!). What a great giveaway! Congrats to WHOMEVER wins the giveaway.

  11. I love King Arthur flour. Don’t know how I feel about the plastic for rising the dough. I have a stoneware bowl I am pretty partial to but I know my Dad would love this deal.

  12. Would love to be entered. My husband is eyeing my new cambro bucket to take his protein with him when he deploys in a couple weeks!! What ever will I do without a good dough bucket? 🙂 Have a great holiday guys, you deserve it!

  13. This is my first time on the site. I learned about the book etc this weekend while taking a spinning (making yarn) workshop. Can’t wait to get started! This cornbread looks great.

  14. Just learned about your books at a recent community ed class – I still can hardly believe I can make such good bread so easily. I’m looking forward to getting the books and trying different variations.

  15. I’m new to bread making and am so excited about this giveaway! I want to avoid HFCS in my children’s food!

  16. So glad I found this! My dream of home baked bread for everyday soon to become reality….
    and I can’t wait to show off this recipe on Thanksgiving!

  17. Can’t wait to try this one! I made the Broa with the whole grain master recipe and it was fantastic! My current fav is adding dried cranberries and walnuts to the whole grain master, using 1/4 C of honey in place of 1/4 C of water. Great for breakfast, My friends can’t believe I made it.

  18. Thanks for the recipe. I’ve been a big fan of ABI5 for a long time and just picked up a bunch of supplies last night for this, the start of bread season.

  19. I’m soooo excited to learn about this website. The bread looks wonderful and can’t wait to make a batch. Thanks Phil

  20. Cornmeal and cranberries are perfect for Thanksgiving. Would love to win the prize and set my daughter up with ABin5.

  21. I’ve just started using your cookbook; in fact I have some dough resting in the fridge now, and came here to see if I could find a dinner roll recipe.

    I’m a big fan of King Arthur Flour and hope I have commented early enough to make the drawing!

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