There’s not a whole lot that a side of cornbread doesn’t improve. It goes well with spicy, sweet, and savory dishes. It’s lovely to have plain cornbread with just a pat of butter. But, sometimes you want to mix it up a bit. Well, this broccoli cheddar cornbread has the classic flavor medley we know and love, but baked into some corn muffins.

This is a great way to add some variety to your menu, but it’s also a budget-stretching dish. With this recipe you can make a box of cornbread mix stretch to feed more people, all with ingredients you probably already have on hand.

This recipe is super easy to make since there’s very little measuring. You do need to thaw and drain the frozen broccoli, which I did in a few hours in a warm kitchen while I was baking other things. To make it simple you could let it sit overnight or gently defrost the broccoli in the microwave.

In addition to the broccoli there’s also an onion in the mix, as well as some garlic powder and other spices. To that a generous amount of shredded cheddar cheese and some cream cheese completes this flavor combo.

This recipe makes 18 muffins. I didn’t have that many muffin tins, so I used a small 8″ cast iron skillet and 2 6-slot muffin pans. If you choose to use a skillet instead of muffin pans, you will almost certainly have to increase your bake time. In my case it was a full 15 minutes longer than the muffins!

You want to bake these until a knife comes out clean (aside from any melted cheese). But, you should know that if you’re doing a feel test by tapping on the tops, these muffins are very moist because of the vegetables. These are not the dry cornbread muffins you may have become used to and because of that they remain a bit springy when you press on them.

Serve these alongside some soup for the perfect lunch or light dinner. With a little dollop of butter on top these muffins are a decidedly rich and tasty take on your standard cornbread.