Sausage Cornbread

June. The baby month. The month I've been counting toward since October, since the CVS parking lot, since the two dark lines under the flossing poster. June is here and the baby is here — inside me, ready, waiting for whatever signal babies wait for. The signal that says: now. Go. It's time. Enter the world, however broken the world is. Enter it anyway.

Protests in Nashville. Protests everywhere. The city is marching and the city is hurting and I am thirty-nine weeks pregnant and watching from the window because I can't march, not like this, not with a baby pressing on my cervix and my back screaming and my body saying: SIT DOWN. But I watch. I see the signs. I hear the chanting. I think about the baby and what the baby will ask someday: where were you when? Where was I? I was in a window. Growing a person. Watching the world demand that people like the person I'm growing get to breathe.

Terrence is on high alert. Every phone ring, every text notification, he answers immediately. He's sleeping in his clothes. He told Gloria to be ready to drive to Nashville — not to be at the hospital (one person rule) but to be NEAR, to be in the city, to be available for whatever comes after the baby comes out and the world has one more person in it who needs to be held and named and loved.

Mama made food and dropped it on the porch. Three days of meals: pot roast, chicken and rice, a pan of cornbread. She's feeding me through the door again. Feeding me for labor. Feeding me the way women have always fed other women before they give birth — the food that says: eat this. You need strength. What you're about to do requires everything you have. I ate the pot roast standing at the counter and the baby kicked and I said: "Soon. I know. Soon."

Oliver called. He and Danielle sent a care package: diapers, wipes, a onesie that says "Nashville's Newest" in country-music font. Oliver said: "You doing okay?" I said: "I'm about to have a baby during a pandemic and a racial reckoning and I'm fine." He laughed. I laughed. Laughing is the only appropriate response to the absurdity of this moment. Laughter and cornbread. The two Mitchell solutions to every problem.

I made nothing new this week. I ate Mama's food. I rested. I nested. I waited. The waiting is the recipe. The waiting is the dish I'm cooking now — slow, patient, inevitable. The baby is the dish. The baby is almost done. The timer is almost up. The oven door is about to open.

Mama’s cornbread was the last thing I ate before the baby came, standing at the counter with one hand on the counter and one hand on my belly, and it tasted exactly like every hard and holy moment she’s ever fed me through. I said laughter and cornbread are the two Mitchell solutions to every problem—and I meant it. If you’re feeding someone who is about to do something enormous, something that requires everything they have, make them this: sausage cornbread, warm from the oven, the kind that fills the kitchen and says I’m right here even when you can’t be in the room.

Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cook Time: 30 minutes | Total Time: 45 minutes | Servings: 9

Ingredients

1/2 lb ground breakfast sausage (mild or spicy)
1 cup yellow cornmeal
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1 cup buttermilk
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted and slightly cooled
1 tablespoon honey
1 cup shredded sharp cheddar cheese, divided
1/3 cup diced green onions (optional)

Instructions

Preheat and prepare. Preheat oven to 400°F. Grease a 9-inch square baking pan or a 10-inch cast iron skillet generously with butter or cooking spray and set aside.
Brown the sausage. In a skillet over medium-high heat, cook the ground sausage, breaking it apart with a spoon, until fully cooked through with no pink remaining, about 6–8 minutes. Drain off excess fat and set sausage aside to cool slightly.
Mix dry ingredients. In a large bowl, whisk together the cornmeal, flour, baking powder, salt, and pepper until combined.
Mix wet ingredients. In a separate medium bowl, whisk together the buttermilk, eggs, melted butter, and honey until smooth.
Combine. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and stir until just combined—do not overmix. Fold in the cooked sausage, 3/4 cup of the shredded cheddar, and green onions if using.
Bake. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and spread evenly. Sprinkle the remaining 1/4 cup of cheese over the top. Bake for 25–30 minutes, or until the top is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
Rest and serve. Let the cornbread cool in the pan for at least 10 minutes before cutting into squares. Serve warm. Wraps well for porch delivery.

Nutrition (per serving)

Sausage Cornbread — The Mitchell Solution to Everything