One fish, two fish, fresh fish good!

My dad and cousin went fishing this morning in the Gulf of Mexico and caught us dinner. We’ll be enjoying Spanish mackerel that was swimming this morning and will be bathing this evening in a special basting sauce of butter, the juice of one lemon, a capful of Worcestershire sauce and a sprinkle of lemon pepper. Here is a picture of one of the pretty fillets:

Accompanying this fish will be some of my mom’s cornbread. She’s never actually used a recipe so it took some doing to get this one. I had to stop her at each pinch, dab and dollop to actually measure things out.

Mama’s Cornbread

1 cup all purpose flour

1 cup corn meal

4 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 egg beaten into 1 cup of milk

1/4 cup of Crisco vegetable shortening

8”cast iron skillet

Preheat oven to 425 F with the skillet in the oven, melting the Crisco. Mix all other ingredients in a large bowl. Pour in a portion of the melted shortening until it is a loose but not runny consistency. Pour the mixture into the skillet, over the remaining shortening.

Cook for 25 minutes, until the top is golden brown.

For added corn flavor, replace all but 1/4 cup of all purpose flour with corn flour and replace 1/4 cup of corn meal with a coarse, stone ground corn meal softened in 1/4 cup of milk.