When I began dating my husband I looked forward to Sunday dinners at his grandparents' home for many reasons, but one of those reasons was the delicious corn.
For quite a few years now I have been buying ears of corn by the many dozen when the price is right with the goal of blanching it, cutting it off the cob, and freezing it so that our family can enjoy corn year round. My cousin was recently visiting and I served corn with our dinner. She noticed the difference (it's rather obvious) and asked how I did it. I happily told this young lady and sent her home with the "recipe" for blanching and freezing corn. I thought you might like to know, too. Even if you only prepare a couple ears of corn for the freezer, it is well worth it!
- You'll want to start with fresh corn. Your farmer's market or produce stand will have much fresher corn than your local grocery store. (Bonus for me: the price is awesome!)
- Shuck the corn as you normally would, removing the corn silks as much as possible. I recently learned how much easier it is to do this into a wheelbarrow instead of just a bag!
- I prefer to remove any bad parts at this time. You can even take your knife outside to remove the bad parts before moving on to the next corn ear.
- Using your largest pots, bring water to boil. The pot should not be full since you need to leave room for the corn!
- Place the ears of corn in boiling water.
- Boil for 4-6 minutes. (I aim for 4 minutes.) (This is the blanching process.)
- Prepare large amounts of ice water. Be generous with the ice. Your clean kitchen sink works well for this!
- Remove with tongs so you can reuse the water. Place ears of corn in the ice water. The ice water will stop the cooking process and allow you to handle the corn. Use fresh ice water with each additional batch of corn.
- Remove corn from the cob. Picture below is a corn remover from Pampered Chef that I do enjoy using. (Others are available.) I have also used an electric knife which works well. A sharpened standard knife is fine, too! (I highly recommend a knife sharpener if you don't have one!)
- Freeze portions suitable for your situation and family. The corn is so liquidy that if you just pop it all in one container it will freeze in a giant clump. I use freezer-safe zipper bags, labeled with date.
- If using bags, be sure to remove the extra air and make the corn lay flat in the bag so the bags can stack on one another or be "filed" in your freezer.
- I use a wooden ruler to make a bit of a dividing line in my bags of corn. Then I can get two meals in one bag. It's not perfect, but it works for me.
So far I have only frozen about 5 dozen ears of corn this summer (in one morning). I need to do at least
Are there any vegetables that you like to can or freeze for the winter? Motivated to try corn? It's well-worth it!
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This is awesome, and just what I needed! My daddy gave us some corn on the cob(I think from my granddad)for us to put in the freezer. It was already in bags, so I don't know what he did beforehand. I never eat my corn *from* the cob, but I do enjoy the fresher taste. (We've already raided the corn stash a couple of times.) Now I can buy a bunch of fresh corn and actually know what to do with it. ;)
ReplyDeleteBluerose, I'm so glad you appreciate it, too! Enjoy doing it yourself!
DeleteIs it cheaper than, say, a Costco bag of corn? Because the price is about right at the moment but I Haven't tried this yet because I'm not convinced in the price (for the effort.....at this point in time!). I'm in the middle of canning a ton of things (including green beans which is pretty much the only vegetable I mess with) but corn is something I DO use a lot of.
ReplyDeleteIn the midst of salsa and applesauce I'm never sure if I should toss corn into the mix. Can you give a cost comparison? (It's ok if not, just thought I'd ask!)
Cost effective...likely not. We eat more corn when it is not from the grocery store bc it is SO much better! Not only that, the kernels tend to be smaller. So likely not if you spend $3-4/dozen. I would say it might be close at $2/dozen. I think 10 dozen will get us through eating it 1-2x a week. (We don't do lots of variety...)
DeleteI am loving this blog post.
ReplyDelete