I’m particularly excited about cornmeal lately after acquiring a new stash of the freshly stone-ground gold from my cousin Mark. He runs the cornmeal grinding exhibit at the Mountain State Art and Craft fair in Ripley every year, and I was there helping out at the sales table last weekend.

He grinds the corn fresh right there, the old-fashioned way, for people to see. Whole corn goes into a big hopper at the top.

The ground cornmeal shoots out and is shaken on the tray, leaving the bran, or chaff, behind. (This is great for mixing into chicken or pig feed.)

The cornmeal is bagged up immediately for sale.

You can’t get any fresher than that! I could hardly wait to get home to make some cornbread–and come up with some new recipes. This one for Maple-Bacon Corn Muffins comes originally from a friend, who had found the recipe somewhere and changed it up. She passed it on to me, and I made some more changes that sounded as if they would suit me–and the result is insanely delicious. I had to share it.

Maple-Bacon Corn Muffins:

1 cup yellow corn meal
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
3/4 cup maple syrup
3/4 cup milk
1/4 cup sour cream
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
1/4 teaspoon maple extract
10 slices bacon, cooked, chopped

Preheat over to 425-degrees. Line a muffin pan with cups or spray with oil. Stir together cornmeal, flour, baking powder, brown sugar, and salt. Make a well in the center of flour mixture and add the eggs, syrup, milk, sour cream, vegetable oil, and maple extract. Mix until combined then stir in the chopped bacon. This is a fairly thin muffin batter. Fill the muffin cups about 3/4 full and bake for about 20 minutes–watch them for browning.

*Makes 15-16 muffins.

The maple flavor is perfect with the cornmeal and bacon, and they are FULL of bacon!

These are, hands down, the best corn muffins I’ve ever tried. Try them and let me know what you think!

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