Hush puppies are round cornmeal dumplings that usually accompany a big dish of fried fish. There are many different ideas as to how hush puppies got their name. If you check the internet, you will come up with some of the following: 1. Confederate soldiers used their corn biscuit rations to feed to their dogs to quiet them in order to avoid detection from Union soldiers, hence the phrase hushing the puppies. 2. It is believed that while cooking fried foods with batter outside such as fish, balls of batter were fried and given to the dogs to keep them from begging or barking, thus the name “hush puppies”. 3. (This one is my favorite. I am a Kentuckian and it makes sense to me.) They were fried up to toss to the dogs to keep them quiet while the “revenooers” were snooping around looking for stills. Whatever explanation, fried catfish just isn’t the same without them.
Filed under: Southern Cornmeal Hush Puppies Tagged: | Beer, brunch, buttermilk, catfish fillets, corn biscuit, cornmeal, cornmeal dumplings, dinner, easy recipes, Entertaining, food, hush puppies, Onions, Southern, southern lady
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Another one I have heard is that when slaves were escaping north during the civil war they would feed these to the dogs to aid their escape.
Without ever having had the real thing before, I have tried to make these, except I always used baking powder to make them puff up just because I imagined them puffing up as they are being fried. Is that ever done, not done, or is there some other property that makes them puff up?
You can use baking powder if you like. I just make them into balls and they seem to stay the same size I make them. If you use the beer instead of milk they are lighter and fluffier.
I’ll have to try them this way..
Love me some good homemade hushpuppies! Ever added kernel corn to them? Great dipped in homemade jalapeno nacho sauce. Wish I had some right now with a big ol’ platter of fried catfish!!
I prefer to use white cornmeal for these and I use a grater for the onion so u don’t get onion pieces in the puppy!
I have even added a bet of hot sauce to them just as to add a little falvor.
If you fry your hushpuppies in deep oil they will turn themselves over when they are brown enough and brown the other side. No foolin!
Use Cattail Cornmeal for making hushpuppies fried in Crisco Oil….drain well on paper towel and serve immediately with real butter…onion powder works well in this recipe if you don’t want to cut up onions. Follow directions on the bag. Yum
Grate a potato in the hushpuppy receipe…..good
Once out of desperation I used salsa in the batter (I usually add some ketchup) and found this to be the best addition ever!
Sounds good Lia. I like to dip them in salsa anyway.
I put a jalapeno, diced sweet onions, and grated cheddar cheese in my hush puppies .
These look good!
tablespoon of sugar added. yum
This is the way I make mine, but I add a little green bell pepper and I add a little oil to the batter.
Just like I do except for cayenne pepper……the beer makes them light and fuffly
That’s the wonderful thing about hush puppies…you can add so many different ingredients in them and they always turn out great!