Spiced Vegan Cornbread

Are you ready for a refreshing new take on Vegan Cornbread? Many cornbread recipes are sweet, almost like a dessert, dripping with butter and honey. This one is not.

It’s a little bit spicy, a little Indian flavored, textured with whole corn kernels, and made with a variety of grains.  

We would call it a savory vegan cornbread. It’s still light with a mildly sweet corn flavor and shines when dripping with melted vegan butter. We love to serve it with our Black Bean Chili or Egyptian Bean Soup. The boys are always excited to find it in their lunches too.

The recipe calls for barley flour, but if you don’t have it, feel free to use whole wheat or a flour mixture you prefer.  We recently learned that barley is one of the oldest bread grains used on the planet, so we bought a bag and are experimenting with it. Barley is higher in fiber (nearly 7x higher than all-purpose unbleached white flour), most minerals and vitamins, and has the cholesterol-lowering powerhouse, beta-glucan.

Order it here: Organic Barley Flour.

Barley is also our family favorite grain to eat in place of rice and in vegetable soups. We even add it to our lentil dahl when we want to go for a one-pot meal that doesn’t include bread, naan, idli, or rice.  (Idli? What’s this? It’s the cutest little Indian dumpling! Recipe coming soon!)

We hope you and your family enjoy this savory vegan cornbread!

Here's the quick and easy process:

1. Add jalapeños and corn to your dry ingredients.

2. Mix. 

3. Add wet ingredients and mix. Spread into pan.

5. Bake and enjoy! 

If you like this recipe you might enjoy our Superfood Vegan Banana Bread recipe too! 

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Jump to the Spiced Vegan Cornbread Grocery List

Jump to the Spiced Vegan Cornbread Nutritional Analysis

Spiced Vegan Cornbread Recipe

Prep

• 10 minutes prep, 35-40 minutes to bake
• Serves 8
• Suggested equipment: 8x8” baking pan, mixing bowl

Ingredients

• 1 Tbsp ground flax seed
• 2 Tbsp water
• 1 1/4 cups soy milk
• 2 tsp apple cider vinegar
• 3 Tbsp coconut oil, room temperature or melted
• 3 Tbsp coconut sugar, raw sugar, or brown sugar
• 1 Tbsp chopped jalapeño pepper
• 1 cup fresh corn kernels
  
  
• ½ cup barley flour
• 1 cup fine corn flour or masa harina flour
• ½ cup whole wheat flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• ½ tsp baking soda
• ½ tsp salt
  
  
• ½ tsp Garam Masala or other Indian curry powder to sprinkle on top

Instructions

1. Pre-heat the oven to 350F (177C).
2. Lightly grease an 8x8” baking pan or pie plate.
3. Mix the ground flax and water together in a small dish. Set aside.
4. Mix soy milk and apple cider vinegar in a small bowl. Set aside.
5. Combine all dry ingredients together: barley flour, whole wheat flour, cornflour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, and salt.
6. Add the coconut oil and mash it into the dry ingredients until there are no chunks left.
7. Stir flax/water mixture into the soy milk/apple cider vinegar mixture.
8. Add the jalapeños and corn to the dry ingredients. Pour the flax/soy milk mixture into the bowl and stir until mixed.
9. Spread into the prepared baking pan.
10. Sprinkle the Garam Masala or other Indian curry powder over the top.
11. Bake for 35-40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center emerges clean.
12. Remove from heat. Serve at any time! 

Chef's Notes 

This recipe is stunningly easy and warms you up with jalapeño and Indian spices. If you prefer to go a sweet route, skip the peppers and curry and increase the sugar by 2 Tbsp.  As with most of our recipes, it’s flexible!

You can also add a rainbow of color with finely chopped yellow, red, and orange bell peppers (capsicum), or vegan cheddar shreds.

Keep the base batter steady and funk it up however you like!

We purchase our Indian Spices from a mostly organic, small, family-owned business called Pure Indian Foods. Click HERE to order this recipe's Garam Masala, or get whole spices to make it yoruself! We have a recipe here: Home-made Garam Masala. 

You can read more about Indian Spices in our Vegan Indian Cooking Guide!

We hope you love this recipe as much as we do! If you have an article or recipe requests, let us know on our Facebook page: Your Vegan Family. While you're there, please like our page and share our posts!

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Written by Your Vegan Family 

Stacy and Markus live an adventurous vegan lifestyle and write articles about their experiences cooking global vegan cuisine, creating businesses, raising vegan kids, and traveling through more than 65 countries. They earned degrees in molecular biology and acupuncture, consulted over decades for healthcare companies and individuals, created businesses in Asian medicine, eco-tourism, cultural immersion, and taught yoga in myriad venues.

We’ve learned a lot from eating a plant-based diet for 25 years and are eager to share more with you. Learn more on our About Us page.

Spiced Vegan Cornbread Recipe Grocery List: 

• ground flax seed
• soy milk
• apple cider vinegar
• coconut oil
• coconut sugar, raw sugar, or brown sugar
• fresh jalapeño pepper
• fresh corn 
• barley flour
• fine corn flour or masa harina
• whole wheat flour
• baking powder
• baking soda
• salt
• Garam Masala or curry powder

Spiced Vegan Cornbread Recipe Nutritional Analysis

The information shown is an estimate provided by an online nutritional calculator. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice. When exact ingredients are not available in this database, the closest substitution is made. 

This recipe includes flax seeds, but this nutrition analysis database doesn't. That means this recipe is even more nutritious than reported!

Percentages are based on a 2,000 calorie daily diet for an adult. 

 * Some of the links in this article may be affiliate links. If you use them and make a purchase, we may receive a small payment. You will not be charged extra for this. Thank you for your support!