Rare Southern Hoe Cake Recipe
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If you like biscuits, you’re guaranteed to love this rare but delectable recipe for southern hoe cake.
Hoe cake (also known as a Johnny cake) seems to be a rather elusive recipe, even among southerners. Apart from my own, I have only one friend whose family still makes it. Even among us though, the variations are vast. His family makes their cornmeal hoe cakes using cornmeal and buttermilk, as seems to be the custom among recipes found on the web. While this style of generally resembles a , a is typically fluffier and doesn’t include . Meanwhile, my family’s version uses flour and produces a bread that looks like buttermilk biscuits, but with a lighter and fluffier texture and crispy coating.
Either way you look at it, hoe cake is revered by those who know of it. I am sure its origin sprang forth much like the rest of our classic southern dishes – too little time and too few ingredients. While it is a simple food to make, it will easily take over the starring role at your dinner table.
I can honestly say that this is a rare recipe for Southern hoe cakes, having searched and not found it anywhere online. I do hope you will try it and guarantee that if you like biscuits, you’ll love our southern hoe cake recipe. Serve your hoe cake as a side dish with maple syrup, apple butter, or butter with a drizzle of honey or sprinkle of sugar. It tastes best accompanying your favorite Southern-style main meal. I recommend fried chicken, chicken and gravy (use the hoe cake to soak up the gravy, yum), North Alabama-style pulled BBQ chicken, or pork chops.
Recipe ingredients
Recipe ingredients- Self-rising flour. If you don’t have self rising flour where you are, go here for the formula of how to make your own.
- Vegetable shortening
- Whole milk
Helpful Kitchen Tools
Combine two cups of self-rising flour and 1/2 cup of shortening in a .
Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Pour a thin layer of vegetable oil into the bottom of a cake pan.
This is where the old folks use a cast iron skillet like you would make cornbread. However, at the time of this tutorial, Mama had yet to hand down a cast iron skillet to me so I figured a cake pan with a wee bit of wear on it is just as good. Either way, you’re going to add enough oil to cover the bottom of your cake pan and then stick it in the oven while it preheats.
Add one cup of milk to your and stir with a spoon until all wet.
It should look like this.
You can add about a quarter of a cup more of milk if need be, but what we are aiming for here is soupy biscuit batter.
All that brown is the crispy bread. This is SO GOOD!
Cut it any way you choose, add some apple butter and dig in!
Recipe Notes
- If you want to make this southern hoe cake a savory side dish like , you can easily add in jalapenos, grated cheese, or chopped fried bacon with a drop of .
Storage
- If you have leftovers, store them in an airtight container in the fridge for up to four days.
- Otherwise, you can freeze hoe cake in a sealed container or bag for up to three months.
- When you need to reheat the hoe cake, it’s best to place the slices on a baking sheet in a 350-degree oven for five to 10 minutes.
Recipe FAQs
What do you serve with hoe cake?
Serve your hoe cake as a side dish with maple syrup, apple butter, or butter with a drizzle of honey or sprinkle of sugar. It tastes best accompanying your favorite Southern-style main meal. I recommend fried chicken, chicken and gravy (use the hoe cake to soak up the gravy, yum), North Alabama-style pulled BBQ chicken, or pork chops.
Where does the name hoe cake come from?
Just like there are a few variations of hoe cake recipes, there are some variations in the explanation of how it got its name. It appears to have first been recognized in print in 1745, according to the Oxford Dictionary. But others have pointed out that the term hoe was used for cooking and it was similar to a griddle. And that my friends seems to be where the term hoe cake (or should it be ?) got its name.
Can you make hoe cake gluten-free?
Yes, you can easily make this southern hoe cake recipe gluten-free. Just simply use gluten-free self-rising flour instead and follow the below instructions.
Ingredients
- 2 cups self-rising flour
- 1 cup milk
- 1/2 cup vegetable shortening
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425. Pour a thin layer of oil to cover the bottom of an eight-inch round cake pan and place it in the oven to heat.
- Cut shortening into the flour well. Pour milk in and stir until wet.
- Pour into the well-heated pan and bake for fifteen to twenty minutes or until browned.
- Invert onto plate.
Nutrition
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I’m so glad to have found this recipe. My brother and I have talked about this bread recipe for about the last 20 years. My auntie use to make this for breakfast and dinner everyday for my grandfather. This was his favorite thing. My auntie always called it “flour bread”. Thank u so much for this recipe and I know my brother will be very excited to know I finally found the recipe.
Oh my gosh! Thank you for posting this. This looks just like my Grandaddy’s recipe – which I have yet to perfect. I can’t wait to try it and see how close it comes to my memories. I’ve been working off and on for years now to try and reproduce it. As a young teen with (what I thought at the time) was far more important things, I failed to have him teach me. He passed away before I recognized my mistake. My grandmother remembered basically how he made it, but without him here to guide me, it just hasn’t been quite right.
Christy, I pratically lived on this growing up at my Granny’s house! I’ve done your recipe for it and it’s as good as my Granny’s! My husband requests this A LOT and I’m more than happy to make it for him. Thanks for keeping “Granny” memories alive for me!
Thank you so much!!! My mom and uncle both made Hoe Cake in this manner and both passed and didn’t write down the recipe. Momma always made it and served it with warm apple sauce. BEST. EVER!!!!!! can’t wait to make it today for my family.
I am so glad you found the recipe LaVenia! I hope you enjoy!!
Christy, you have given us a new favorite! Thanks for sharing this fab recipe, which I have passed to several friends along with your website bookmark. For kicks, I tried this in an iron popover/muffin pan and we like the individual size even better. There is no cutting involved and everyone gets more crisp crust! They make great salmon patty “sandwiches” with pepper jelly. Thanks again for this and all your great recipes and stories. God bless!
We had this growing up and was cooked in our family for many generations.
Our recipe is simple. Flour and Milk and or water.
Delish
This is the first time that I have seen this recipe in print. Everyone around here uses cornmeal in their hoecake. My parents were from the mountains of NC. This is almost exactly the way that they make hoecake.The only difference is that instead of greasing the pan and cutting in the shortening, we put the shortening (or lard) in the pan, melt it, swish it around the pan and pour it into the batter. Cuts out a step or two. My husband had never heard of hoecake when we got married in 1969. I made hoecake for him and that was the only bread that he wanted after that. He preferred it over biscuits. So do all 3 of my children and 4 grandchildren. Thanks for the memories.