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This Sweet Potato Cornbread recipe is a moist, delicious mix between golden buttery cornbread and creamy sweet potato pie. Ready in less than an hour, this cornbread is super easy to make as the perfect side to a holiday dinner or a casual weeknight meal.
I can’t imagine southern comfort food without either a classic cornbread recipe or sweet potato pie. Just imagine the joy I felt when I combined them but and took traditional cornbread up a notch!
To up the ante, I made a delicious cinnamon honey butter to go with it and it. was. so. GOOD!
If you love southern cornbread and sweet potatoes, then this brown sugar Sweet Potato Cornbread is definitely for you! It’s rounded out with warm spices and the sweet potatoes give it a slightly sweet flavor that’s so really delightful.
The texture of this cornbread is so moist and soft but with crispy edges – we don’t do dry cornbread around here!
Skip the box of Jiffy , this recipe is completely from scratch. In addition, I added a shortcut by using sweet potato puree instead of roasted sweet potatoes and the final product is soft and flavorful. You only need a few simple ingredients to make this dish. Served fresh from the oven with some butter and maple syrup, you’ll be reaching for seconds soon enough!
Table of Contents
Ingredient Notes
- Buttermilk: If you want a moist, tender crumb, then you need to add this. Check out my two-ingredient buttermilk recipe!
- Sour cream: This add delicious flavor and moisture to the cornbread.
- Butter: It should be melted but not scorching hot. We don’t want to cook the eggs!
- Vegetable oil – this gives the cornbread a moist, fluffy texture that’s to die for.
- Brown sugar and sugar: For moisture and an enriched sweetness, add this.
- Spices: I brought in classic spices like ground cinnamon and nutmeg. You can also use my pumpkin pie spice for this recipe to really get those warm Fall flavors.
- Sweet potato puree: The base of your flavor, this gives the cornbread that sweet potato flavor. You can use whole sweet potatoes and make mashed sweet potatoes to use in this recipe, but using the puree is so much faster!
- Flour: All-purpose flour works best.
- Yellow Cornmeal: This course, fine ground cornmeal results in the perfect texture and is necessary to make cornbread. You can also use white cornmeal if that’s what you have on hand.
Tips
- Be sure to use room temperature eggs, buttermilk, and sour cream. This allows the batter to form without curdling from the difference in temperature.
- Pro tip: if using actual sweet potatoes for this recipe, you make sure to remove the stringy fibers before adding to the sweet potato cornbread batter.
How to Make Sweet Potato Cornbread
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
Mix the Wet Ingredients
In a large mixing bowl, whisk buttermilk, sour cream, melted butter, vegetable oil, brown sugar, and sugar. Whisk everything together and then add vanilla extract and eggs and whisk in sweet potato puree.
Add the Dry Ingredients
In a separate bowl, combine cornmeal, flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Fold cornmeal mixture into the wet ingredients.
Bake Sweet Potato Cornbread
Spray a 10-inch cast iron skillet or a 10-inch round baking pan with nonstick baking spray and add batter. Bake for 35-40 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean.
Cool
Allow cornbread to cool for 10 minutes. Brush the top of the cornbread with additional butter and let it melt into the bread. Enjoy!
What to Eat with Sweet Potato Cornbread
Although this cornbread is sweeter than your classic recipe, it’s still an ideal side for dinner. It would pair well with a savory side. Here are some ideas:
- Are you enjoying it as a snack? Serve this with elevated compound butter like honey butter or peach bourbon butter.
- Imagine this crammed on a plate filled with soul food! Right between the turkey wings, fried chicken, collard greens, baked beans, and mac and cheese.
- Cozy up this fall with cornbread and a bowl of chili. It’s the perfect way to enjoy a sweet and savory meal.
- Pair sweet potato cornbread with BBQ baby back ribs.
Variations
- Cornbread Muffins: Simply pour the cornbread batter into a muffin pan. They should only take 25-30 minutes to bake.
- Vegan: Use almond milk and vegan butter instead of buttermilk and regular butter to make vegan sweet potato cornbread.
- Gluten-Free: Make gluten-free sweet potato cornbread by using gluten-free flour.
Recipe FAQs
Prevent crumbly cornbread by making sure to accurately measure the flour, cornmeal, and butter (yes, you can use too much in the batter) so that the cornbread isn’t too crumbly. Avoid overmixing the batter so the cornbread doesn’t become dens Also, be sure not to overcook it.
You can add bacon, or better yet candied bacon, actual corn, jalapenos, sausages – the options are limitless!
After the cornbread has completely cooled, place it in an airtight container and store it in the fridge for up to one week. If you want it to last longer, place it in the freezer. When you are ready to enjoy it, reheat it in the microwave or let it sit out and get to room temperature.
More Cornbread Recipes
Appetizers
Coconut Cornbread with Sweet Lime Butter
Appetizers
Grandma’s Buttermilk Cornbread
Appetizers
Honey Butter Cornbread
Appetizers
Jalapeno Honey Cornbread
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Let’s stay connected on social media and continue to cook together! Also, if you decide to make this recipe, please leave a star rating on the recipe card and leave a comment below! Tag @BritneyBreaksBread on Instagram and hashtag #britneybreaksbread so I can see your creations! I hope that you love this recipe as much as we do!
Sweet Potato Cornbread
Ingredients
- 1 cup Buttermilk
- ¼ cup Sour cream
- ½ cup Butter, , melted
- 2 tbsps Vegetable oil
- ½ cup Brown sugar
- ¼ cup Sugar
- 2 tsp Vanilla extract
- 2 Eggs
- 1/2 cup Sweet potato puree
- 1½ cup Flour
- 1 cup Cornmeal
- 2 tsp Cinnamon
- ½ tsp Nutmeg
- 2 tsp Baking powder
- ½ tsp Baking soda
- ½ tsp Kosher salt
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. In a large bowl, whisk together buttermilk, sour cream, melted butter, vegetable oil, brown sugar, and sugar. Whisk everything together and then add vanilla extract and eggs and whisk in sweet potato puree.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, cornmeal, cinnamon, nutmeg, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Fold into the wet ingredients.
- Spray a 10-inch cast iron skillet or a 10 inch round baking pan with nonstick baking spray and add batter. Bake for 30-35 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean.
- Allow cornbread to cool for 10 minutes. Brush the top of the cornbread with additional butter and allow it to melt into the bread. Enjoy!
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
I made muffins and they are delicious.
So glad to hear that, thank you!
I made this cornbread for a group of friends and it came out perfectly moist and delicious. It got so many rave reviews. I didn’t have a 10-inch cast iron skillet or round baking pan available, so I baked this cornbread in a 7×11 rectangular baking dish and it was done in about 25 minutes. This was my first time making cornbread from scratch and I will be definitely using this recipe again and again. Thanks!
Hi Melvin! Thanks so much for your review, I’m SO happy that you enjoyed it! Happy New Year!
At what point do you add the nutmeg and cinnamon? This isn’t mentioned the recipe.
Hi, it’s mentioned in step two. I hope that helps, thank you!
What can you use instead of sour cream? Buttermilk?can you use more than 1/2 cup of sweet potatoes?
You can use full fat greek yogurt in place of sour cream. I would not use more than a 1/2 cup of sweet potatoes, it’ll make the cornbread doughy.