How to Make a Box of Jiffy Cornbread Mix Taste 10x Better

It's officially summer and the living—and the cooking—should be easy. These long lazy days are for relaxing not putting in extra hours in the kitchen (there's plenty of time for that when the holidays roll around). It's the perfect time of year to skip the homemade baked goods and reach for a box. There are tons of boxed baking mixes to love, and one of our absolute favorites is Jiffy cornbread mix.

A grocery store staple since its introduction in the 1930s, Jiffy cornbread mix has a taste and texture that's nostalgic, familiar, and super tasty. The simple mix is also the perfect blank canvas for mix-ins and other tasty things. One recent example we ran across suggested adding melted butter and honey to the pan before adding the cornbread batter to take this simple side up a notch (or 7).

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How to Make Honey Butter Jiffy Cornbread

If the idea of making honey butter sounds intimidating, just know that it's truly as simple as it sounds: honey + butter. For this recipe, just melt butter in the microwave and swirl in honey then mix to combine. That's it! If you want to cut down on the dirty dishes, you can also pop a stick of butter in the baking pan and melt it in the oven as it preheats. For every 8.5-ounce box of cornbread mix, I like to use 1 stick of salted butter (you can use unsalted if you prefer) and 1/2 cup of honey. Just add the melted honey butter to the baking pan, prepare the Jiffy cornbread mix according to the package directions, pour the batter on top of the honey butter and bake.

Related: Ina Garten's Flaky Sea Salt Cornbread Hack

The trick to making the perfect honey butter Jiffy cornbread is to not mix everything together. No mixing is required because all the magic bakes up in the oven, giving you a rich, tender golden cornbread with crispy, caramelized edges and a sweet perfume to scent your kitchen the moment the oven door opens.

On top of adding flavor, the honey butter adds moisture, which means your cornbread will stay soft for days.

Serve with some barbecued meat and coleslaw at your next cookout. If you have any leftovers, griddle it in butter for breakfast the next morning. To gild the lily (and by all means, it's summer, so why not live extravagantly?) fold in sweet corn kernels for the corniest cornbread in all the land.

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