Corn bread recipe

Here´s the recipe to make Corn Bread (broa de milho). I should have tried this one out before, because it´s just divine and made me happy in a way I can´t even explain! Me and my growing bump... yes, I´ve been keeping the news, I´m 16 weeks pregnant and this explains why I haven´t been posting lately. Up until now, I was just extremely sensitive to smells and cooking was the last thing in my mind... But I´m feeling much better now and happy to feel good in the kitchen again!

Now, back to my bread... I made it with the help of my Thermomix, which made the task faster and easier. However it´s ok to do it by hand and definitely worthwhile!

Just some context: corn bread is obviously a bread made with corn flour, it´s very rustic, quite dense and it goes very well with some of the most  traditional Portuguese dishes, like grilled sardines or cod fish. The reason why I made this bread was precisely to prepare a traditional cod fish  dish - by far one of my favorites in the Portuguese cuisine!

With this recipe you can expect to have a great balance between density and softness, even more if compared to the corn bread I would buy in Portugal. And that´s why I loved it so much. One of each happened: the recipe is really like this or I misstepped something, because the bread was denser than I expected. Either way, it worked for me... twice!

My big lunch with friends was last Saturday, so I decided to prepare the bread on Thursday night. My husband and I, because honestly he´s the one who masters the bread technique, not me. Our problem - or joy! - is that we couldn´t resist the temptation and as soon as the bread was ready we ate most of it :) On the following day it was my breakfast and afternoon snack... yes, it´s that good!

On Friday we prepared a new one.

And here´s the recipe:

First it´s necessary to prepare a leavened dough:
- 100 gr of water (sorry, don´t have the equivalent in litters)
- 5 gr of yeast
- 50 gr of wheat flour
- 1 tea spoon of sugar

It´s only necessary to mix these ingredients and let it rest until it gets twice as big.

For the second step the following ingredients are necessary:
- 300 gr of very hot water
- 250 gr of corn flour
- 30 gr of olive oil
- 1 tea spoon of salt
- 100 gr of wheat flour

Mix the water with the corn flour and let it cool down. Only then, you can add the leavened dough, the olive oil, the salt and the wheat flour.

Then, sprinkle the tray with flour and let the bread rest there until it doubles the size and before going to the oven for 60 minutes at 200ºC (preheated).

The bread is ready to devour!