I always enjoy having cornbread with chili and I wanted to try something a little different with the cornbread that I made to go with my beef and black bean chili. Cornbread is another one of those foods where the basic recipe is really just the starting point as there are so many different ingredients that you can add to it. I certainly do like to experiment and in the past I have tried adding different kinds of cheeses, bacon, kernels of corn and even cranberries. One of the nice things about about cornbread is that it can be just a touch on the sweet side and I was thinking that some spicy hot jalapenos would go particularly well with that sweetness in addition to adding some pretty flecky of green. Of course one trick to making a really tasty cornbread is to use bacon grease for the fat, though butter or oil also work and buttermilk adds a hint of tanginess and helps keep things nice and moist. This cornbread would make the perfect side for any bowl of chili but for me, things were just getting started because I had even bigger plans for the leftovers!
