This is seriously the Best Vegan Cornbread! It’s wonderfully moist, perfectly sweet, and easy to make in one bowl. Perfect for pairing with chili!
If you love serving bread with dinner, then you’ll also want to check out my Vegan Dinner Rolls, Vegan Cheddar Bay Biscuits, and Vegan Garlic Bread recipes!
“This! It’s better than non-vegan cornbread. I’m using it in a dressing for Thanksgiving and it’s the best cornbread recipe! So good!” – Susan
I simply cannot make a batch of my Ultimate Vegan Chili without a side of this Easy Vegan Cornbread. The whole family loves it, and it makes a pot of chili go a lot further!
I’ve tried a bunch of vegan cornbread recipes over the years, and none have made my kids smile quite as much as this one. It’s on the sweeter side, but if you’re a savory cornbread fan, feel free to reduce the sugar or fold corn kernels or vegan cheese into the batter. Most importantly, it’s very moist, as classic cornbread should be.
And the best part? It’s super easy to make with 7 ingredients in only 1 bowl! Just dump, mix, bake, and enjoy your perfect cornbread.
Why this is the best vegan cornbread
- Chili’s best friend – Sweet, fluffy, and soft, there’s nothing better than dunking a big slice of vegan cornbread into a steaming hot bowl of this Veggie Chili or this Sweet Potato Black Bean Chili.
- Better than boxed cornbread – This cornbread will remind you of the cornbread that comes from the boxed mix, except it tastes sooo much better! Plus, it’s easy to make with less than 10 ingredients and in one bowl.
- Over 600 reviews – Don’t just take my word for it. This recipe has over 600 reviews from happy readers! Give it a try yourself and you’ll understand why it’s the best.
If you end up loving this vegan cornbread as much as I do, then you’ll want to save my Vegan Cornbread Stuffing recipe for the holiday season. It’s a perfect Thanksgiving side dish!
How to make vegan cornbread
Find the complete recipe with measurements in the recipe card below.
Stir the flour, cornmeal, sugar, salt, and baking powder together in a large bowl. Pour in the almond milk and canola oil and stir until well combined.
Pour the smooth batter into your prepared pan. Bake the cornbread until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
Set the bread aside to cool for a few minutes, then slice and serve with vegan butter, red pepper jelly, maple syrup, or vegan honey on top.
Frequently asked questions
You can fold up to 1/2 cup of corn kernels, canned green chilis, diced jalapenos, or shredded vegan cheddar cheese into the batter. I’ll even sprinkle extras over the top of the batter before baking the cornbread for extra pops of color and flavor.
After testing this recipe countless times, I found that using fine-ground cornmeal always gave me the best, never-gritty results. Medium and coarse cornmeal sometimes work, but they make the cornbread more grainy.
Absolutely! Make the batter as normal, pour it into a lined muffin tin (3/4 of the way full), and bake the muffins for 18 to 20 minutes at 350ºF.
Yes, a quality gluten-free flour mix will work as a replacement for the all-purpose flour here.
Yes, you can cut the sugar in half for less-sweet cornbread or use just a few tablespoons of sugar for a barely sweet cornbread.
The Best Vegan Cornbread
Ingredients
- 1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
- 1 cup yellow corn meal
- 2/3 cup granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 1 1/4 cup unsweetened almond milk
- 1/3 cup canola oil
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F and lightly grease a 8 x 8 pan, or a 9 inch round cake pan.
- In a large bowl, combine the flour, cornmeal, sugar, salt and baking powder and stir.
- Now pour in the almond milk and canola oil. Stir until well combined. Pour batter into prepared pan.
- Bake for 20-25 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
Video
Notes
- Whole grain or gluten free – You may use white whole wheat flour or whole wheat pastry flour in place of all purpose flour if you wish. A quality gluten free flour mix works as well.
- For oil-free – replace the canola oil with applesauce.
- Make cornbread muffins – Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Spray a muffin pan with oil (or use liners) and fill 3/4 of the way full. Bake for 18-20 minutes.
- Less sweet – This a sweet cornbread, but feel free to make it less sweet if you want. You can cut the sugar in half, or even use just a few tablespoons of sugar for a barely sweet cornbread.
- Adapted from allrecipes.
More like corn cake. A bit to much flower and sugar for my liking.
This is an excellent cornbread recipe . Made it for our vegan teen granddaughter and she loves it !
Thank you for your wonderful feedback and review! I’m glad the cornbread was a hit!
Easily my favorite cornbread recipe, thank you Nora!! And last night I had a go at making it gluten free (with Bobs Red Mill) and it was just as good!! Just needed an extra 5 mins or so in the oven. DELISH!
Hi Olivia. Thanks for letting me know how the gluten free version worked for you! I appreciate your encouraging feedback!
Nora, have you ever used this recipe as a topper for tamale pie? Does it come out the same as regular cornbread?
I haven’t tried that, but this is as close to traditional cornbread as it gets, so I’m sure it will work!
When I make it, I’ll let you know how it turns out. Thank you for your response! Have a great day
I’m not really keen on adding the sugar- does it do anything important in the recipe besides flavour? if I just left it out would it be ok?
Thank you! Love your work, made many recipes!
Hi Emily. Thank you for using my recipes! I’m glad you are enjoying them! Omitting the sugar may affect the overall texture of the cornbread, however, you could leave it out. You could also reduce the sugar to your taste. Several have commented they reduced the sugar and it turns out delicious. I hope this helps!
Hello Nora! I’m a big fan of your recipes and I was looking into making this one on corn bread. You said to use Almond milk in your cornbread recipe. But is it bad to use Soy milk instead?
Please write back,
Katrina Juarez
Hi Katrina. Soy milk or any unsweetened dairy free milk will work just as well in this recipe. Happy cooking!
I add fresh diced jalapeno and it comes out fantastic. I had to adjust baking time to 35 minutes for my oven. Came out beautiful.
I use half for a chorizo cornbread stuffing then eat the rest!
Thank you for sharing your fantastic review and comments!
I have made this recipe countless times and it always turns out. It is very simple and I would highly reccomend!
Thank you for your great feedback and review! I’m glad you are loving the cornbread! Happy cooking!
used whole wheat and almond flour, added canned cranberries swirled in with toothpick in muffin tins
Pretty sure I’ve commented before, but now my SO was diagnosed w Type 2 & I’m tweaking recipes to work for him. I made your cornbread & used monk fruit to sweeten & replaced most of the flour with almond flour. It was SO GOOD still(!) I’m in eating disorder recovery & hate the no oil/sugar free/low carb diet culture BS & thought I’d be disappointed w the swaps, but it was still moist & amazing. He ate them w no blood sugar issues (paired w high protein vegan chili & Kite Hill butter on cornbread for more fat.) Magical recipe, Nora! He’s so happy he can still eat your wonderful recipes w just a few tweaks ?
Hi Melissa. I am so glad that the cornbread worked and was delicious with your tweaks! Thank you for sharing your feedback and review! I appreciate you using my recipes, and am so glad your husband can enjoy most of them! Good luck to you both! Happy cooking!
THE BEST VEGAN CORNBREAD is so true!
I never was able to make bread of any kind but after making this recipe I am the best vegan cornbread king of the family, haha. Thank you for easy to follow instructions with easy ingredients to find. We also appreciate that this recipe is made without yeast and yet is so incredibly moist and thick. We also loved the mild sweetness. Also thank you for having videos play that can be enlarged to full screen and stopped and rewound because other sites’ videos do not have video controls. But everything about my experience on your page is high quality. Thank you and I look forward to making more of your recipes and becoming chef howard-nora of my family. haha. Kind Regards.
Hi Howard. I really loved your kind, helpful, and encouraging review and comments! Thank you! I’m so glad you love my recipes ad my videos. Keep on cooking, and I know you’ll become the chef you want to be! Wishing you lot of fun and happy cooking!
So moist! next time I’ll try doing half applesauce since it’s a lot of oil. But so moist! Best vegan cornbread I’ve had.
Thank you for your wonderful feedback! I’m so glad you loved the cornbread!
Hands down, the best and easiest cornbread we’ve ever hand. Super moist, which we love. Much better than crumbly cornbread.
This was so good! I cooked in a ceramic 8×8 and it took about half an hour to cook all the way through. I added fresh jalapeño and corn to the batter. I’ve eaten like half the pan! It was a great side to the vegan chill recipe from this site
Your cornbread sounds so delicious with the added jalapeño and corn! Yum! Thank you for sharing your wonderful feedback, and I’m glad you loved the cornbread!
anyone know how to make this vegan and gluten free?
It’s already vegan, just sub gluten-free flour for regular and use GF cornmeal.
Big hit in my family! Served it with vegan corn bread. Easy and fast!
Thank you so much!!
Love it! So easy and quick. My strict vegan teenager loves it!
What makes it hard if it doesn’t have eggs or flax seeds?
We never ate cornbread growing up, but my fiancé did so I gave this recipe a try. While I wouldn’t say I’ve been converted to the cornbread side, I do like this. It’s simple to make and the texture the very light.
Hi Kate. Thank you for sharing you review and feedback. I’m glad you liked the cornbread!
Made this for dinner this evening as we needed a quick side for our soup! It was so delicious, thank you.
You are welcome! I’m so glad you enjoyed the cornbread! Thank you for sharing!
DELISH! And SO simple! I’ve made this twice now.
I used soy milk, HALF the amount of sugar (I used cane sugar), and instead of vegetable oil I melted 1/3 cup of butter and added that in (because we aren’t vegan haha).
I used our wheat mill to grind up popcorn for the 1 cup of corn meal… and then did half whole wheat flour and half all-purpose flour.
Thank you for sharing your review and ideas! I’m glad you loved the cornbread!
My boss has been Vegan for almost 50 years. I’ve only been vegan/vegetarian for about 8 months.
He told me today that he will be bringing a crockpot full of Vegan chili.
I challenged him to a Chili-duel. (mine will be spicier, but still Vegan)
HOWEVER, my cornbread recipe also includes red-pepper flakes, shredded (vegan) cheese,
Has anybody tried this variation?
Thank you,
molly
I made this yesterday using bread flour and Bob’s Red Mill polenta (needs must when that’s what you have on hand), and it’s so good! Sure, it’s a little grittier, but I’m actually enjoying the texture.
Thank you for sharing! I’m glad you are enjoying the cornbread!
This cornbread it the BEST! So moist and just the right amount of “grit.” I made it last night to go with vegan chili. This will now be my go-to cornbread recipe. Thanks!!
HI Stephanie! I’m thrilled this is now your cornbread go-to recipe! Thank you for sharing your wonderful review and feedback!
I just made some vegan chili too! Can’t wait until the cornbread gets done
I just used your recipe, and it’s really good. I used Robs Red Mill, and it was really gritty. I have another batch cooling that uses polenta, which might be better. I’d like to try a different brand of corn meal, and wondering what you suggest?
I think Bob’s Red Mill’s cornmeal is medium grain, as opposed to fine grain. Fine grain makes for fluffier, less gritty cornbread. I use fine cornmeal for best results. Hope that helps!