cornbread

Cornbread is a quick bread made with cornmeal, popular in the cuisine of the Southern United States, with origins in Native American cuisine. It is an example of batter bread. Dumplings and pancakes made with finely ground cornmeal are staple foods of the Hopi people in Arizona. The Hidatsa people of the Upper Midwest call baked cornbread naktsi, while the Choctaw people of the Southeast call it bvnaha. The Cherokee and Seneca tribes enrich the basic batter, adding chestnuts, sunflower seeds, apples, or berries, and sometimes combine it with beans or potatoes. Modern versions of cornbread are usually leavened by baking powder.

==History== thumb|right|250px|Cornbread, prepared as a muffin Native people in the Americas began using corn (maize) and ground corn as food thousands of years before Europeans arrived in the New World. First domesticated in Mexico around six thousand years ago, corn was introduced to what is now the United States between three thousand and one thousand years ago. Native cooks developed a number of recipes based on corn, including cornbread, that were later adopted by European settlers and slaves —especially those who lived in Southern colonies.