Southern Corn Casserole | Favorite Family Recipes (2024)

Corn casserole is a favorite holiday side dish. The creamy corn center is topped by a golden bread layer for a delicious, crunchy texture.

This corn casserole is a true Southern recipe. My good friend, Alyssa, was kind enough to share her grandmother’s special recipe, and it has been a family favorite ever since. The crispy golden bread layer gives way to a creamy corn center that is bursting with flavor and tantalizing textures. It’s an easy casserole dish to make ahead of time for a holiday meal, but is just as simple to throw together for a busy weeknight supper. Serve alongside roast turkey, slow cooker pork, beefy chili, or even simple chicken tenders.

Ingredients in Corn Casserole

You may be surprised that we don’t use any sort of cornbread mix in this recipe! A lot of corn casseroles call for Jiffy cornbread mix or another boxed mix, but not this one. Here’s all you need for this easy corn casserole recipe:

• Creamed corn – a couple of 15 ounce cans of cream-style corn is perfect for one batch.
• Whole corn kernels – I use a can of drained whole corn, but you could use frozen or fresh corn off the cob if you’d like.
• Saltine crackers – Here’s where our recipe differs from so many others. Crush up some soda or saltine crackers for a delicious crunch. This version tastes less like cornbread and more like an actual corn casserole.
• Milk – use whatever you have on hand.
• Sugar – regular white, granulated sugar adds the perfect amount of sweetness to this recipe.
• Eggs – three whole eggs, slightly whisked.
• Flour – all-purpose flour acts as a thickener when mixed with butter.
• Butter – melted. You can also use bacon grease! See notes below.

Method to Making Corn Casserole

Basically, this is a ‘dump all the ingredients into one bowl’ recipe, which happens to be my favorite kind! Simply stir all the ingredients together, add to a baking dish sprayed with cooking spray, and bake for about 90 minutes or until it’s golden brown on top.

**TIP** For a more “bread-like” texture, just bake the dish longer. It will come out more like cornbread if you add another 15 minutes to the baking time. But if you’d rather a texture along the lines of corn pudding, pull out the dish at about an hour.

Corn Casserole vs Corn Pudding

You may be wondering, what is the difference between corn casserole and corn pudding? In a couple words: not much. Some may argue that corn casserole must be cornbread based, but as long as it has a bready texture, it qualifies. Same with corn pudding. Corn pudding may be slightly less done than corn casserole, making it more “pudding-like” in texture, but it uses the same ingredients. This will vary from family to family and region to region. It really depends on where your recipe is from. But honestly, the biggest difference between the two is simply the name.

Tasty Variations

This recipe is delicious as-is, but if you are wanting to put a spin on it, try adding some (or all) of these ingredients:

• Crumbled bacon (also use some of the bacon grease instead of the melted butter, YUM)
• Chopped jalapeño (the kind in the can, the texture is better than using fresh)
• Add diced onion to the mixture before baking
• Diced green chiles
• Mix in shredded cheddar cheese
• Add a dollop of sour cream to the top of each serving
• Add diced green onions as a garnish

Frequently Asked Questions about Corn Casserole

More Tasty Corn Side Dishes

Who doesn’t love sweet, crunchy corn as a side dish? It goes well with just about anything! Here are some of our favorite ways to prepare corn for dinner:

How to Make Corn Casserole