How to pick good corn:
The Basics Some people say corn should be "knee high by the Fourth of July." That isn't exactly the case according to my farmer friend Alex Paffenroth, but it is very true that corn is a summer special that comes and goes with the warm weather. My father was one of those people that would go to the supermarket and strip every cob clean of all husks and silks, searching diligently for imperfections. He always said that you should look for straight rows of kernels to ensure sweetness.
Again, I always go to the farmer's market for corn. It should be summertime, and you should buy as local as possible. The reason? Corn's sugars turn to starches immediately after being picked. The sooner you eat it after it's picked, the better it will be.
I like to keep the husks my corn. People who pull the husks off the corn are breaking the farmer's heart. Alex tells me that picking corn by hand is not a job he would wish on anyone. It's summertime and the sun blazes down on workers. Three ears for a dollar is a bargain considering how much manual labor and hand picking must go into the handling of the corn. And once a customer peels that husk even part way to get a peek at the corn inside, even if it is the most beautiful ear we have to offer, the next customer will pass on it. Nobody wants corn other people have discarded.
So how do you pick good corn if you can't peel away the husk? Start with a farm stand you like. Or, if you don't have one you like, take a risk on an ear of corn. It's on 35 cents. Once you have a reliable source, just pick medium to large ears of corn. Feel around the top to make sure the kernels have been fully formed all the way to the tip, ensuring maturity. If you see a little brown hole in the tip of the husk, it's probably a tipworm that's burrowed its way into the sugary goodness. If you get an ear with tipworm, it's not the end of the world. Cut it off and put the ear on to boil and don't be a sissy about it. Besides, most of the time the critter you're dealing with is a tipworm found only -- surprise! -- in the tip of the ear.
Varieties Now Alex, like many other farmers these days, grows a super-sweet hybrid which stays sweet for up to 7 days. One of the varieties he grows is named Mirai, which is extremely sweet with huge kernels and a skinny cob inside. I do love a nice ear of sweet white corn, with it's smaller, thin skinned kernels and nice bite, but I'm totally loyal to Alex and always get his guaranteed sweet corn. A lot of customers want to know whether or not Alex's corn is genetically modified. As you can see from the True Food website, GM corn is mostly used for processed foods and animal feed. What Alex grows is a seed that was the result of somewhat natural hybridization. (Of course, agriculture in and of itself is not a natural process, but I digress.) But no genes were spliced in the making of this corn.
Some people say that the super sweet corn is too sweet, sacrificing corn flavor for sugar. For those who feel that way, Sycamore Farms at the Greenmarket has been bringing two batches of corn in a day -- one in the morning that was picked the night before, and one in the afternoon that was picked same day. Their corn is not a super sweet hybrid, but a more standard variety that loses its sweetness as the days go by. So you can go whichever route you like...
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I like an ear of roasted corn from those street stalls, though the corn is never terribly sweet and good. I adore a nice ear of corn boiled for five minutes in water that is NOT salted (which makes the corn tough and changes its color). I love corn toppings -- butter, sea salt, lemon or lime juice, chili powder, yuzu pepper, cumin, coriander, parmesan cheese, shiso furikake, anything goes...but my favorite is that Mexican style corn you can get in restaurants sometimes, barbecued over a flame, slathered with mayonnaise, grated queso blanco, and chili powder, served with a wedge of lime. YUM!
