Just when everyone is singing “This Is the Moment” at the peak of the sweet-corn season in August, I get cranky. No matter how fresh and sweet the corn that shoppers are assaulting in a strip-search frenzy at stores and roadside stands, what I want to know is: Why can’t I find a single ear of my grandfather’s beloved Silver Queen?
Silver Queen is the last of those old-fashioned sweet corns that this generation’s farming forebears loved to plant and eat. They had names like Stowell’s Evergreen, Country Gentleman, Golden Bantam. And they tasted the way corn ought to taste.
For 150 years, breeders have tinkered with sweet corn to improve flavor, texture, tenderness, appearance, growing time and hardiness.
Science meets corn
It’s only in the last 20 years, however, that corn engineers have rocketed corn from sweet to sweeter to supersonic sweetness and thus changed the face of the sweet-corn market.
Bioengineering has changed old-fashioned types like Silver Queen, now called “normals,” into sweeter types called “sugar enhanced” and triply sweet types called “supersweets.” Bioengineering is the reason supersweet corn can be found in supermarkets year-round–and the reason Silver Queen can’t be found in farmers markets at the height of the summer season.
Building a sweeter ear of corn has its advantages–a longer shelf life, for one–but it has left a lot of corn lovers with only a remembrance of corn past.
In my grandfather’s day, rushing corn from field to pot was the only way to get the optimum sweetness, because once the ear was picked, its kernels would begin to convert their sugar to starch. Not anymore. Nowadays, sweet corn is bred to delay conversion, under refrigeration, for 48 hours or more, to retain sweetness during shipping and storing.
Today, breeders categorize all sweet corns as one of three types, based on genetic characteristics that interfere to a greater or lesser degree with the natural conversion of sugar to starch. But there’s a huge gap between those who breed and grow corn and those who buy it.
Consumers are likely to identify their favorite sweet corns by color: white, yellow or bicolored. But it’s the genetic variety, not the color, that determines flavor and texture, and all of the three “sweet” gene types come in all three colors.
Normals, or old-fashioned types like the white Silver Queen, are “sugary,” which means they contain 5 percent to 10 percent sugar before any of it is changed to starch. Other normals, still grown in back-yard gardens but not commercially, include white varieties like Pearl White and Platinum Lady and bicolors like Calypso, Sweet Sue, Seneca Horizon and Cornfetti.
A pair of yellow normals, Merit and Jubilee, are still the standard commercial corns for freezing and canning because production lines have been built around them and people have come to expect a certain taste and texture in canned or frozen corn.
At the next level of sweetness are the sugar-enhanced types, with 15 percent to 25 percent sugar. Most farmers I’ve talked to grow recent varieties of the enhanced types as their main-season sweet corns, like white Argent and Incredible or yellow Miracle, because they are quicker and easier to grow and market than normals. These are the corns sold in green markets and sometimes in grocery stores, when they are selling local varieties.
Finally, there are the supersweet types, which produce as much as 25 percent to 35 percent sugar. They are known as shrunken corn because as they dry, their kernels tend to shrivel more than those with less sugar. Any sweet-corn kernel will shrink some, said Margaret Smith, a corn breeder at the Cornell University College of Agriculture in Ithaca, N.Y.
But supersweets, like yellow Sweetie, white Even Sweeter and bicolor Twice as Nice, shrink more because the sugar solution they are filled with doesn’t maintain the kernels’ shape as well as the starch that’s present in lower-sugar corn.
Supersweets have captured the largest share of the commercial fresh corn market in the last decade, Kristian Holmstrom of Rutgers Cooperative Extension said, because producers want corn that ships better and customers want corn that tastes sweeter–and even sweeter–no matter what its texture. For 10 years, Florida has dominated the commercial sweet-corn crop, shipping supersweet varieties nationally from October to June, until summer crops ripen locally.
A price to pay
If only sweetness were all. Fooling with genes, said Don Prostak, a corn breeder formerly with Rutgers Cooperative Extension who now runs a company of his own, may mean giving up some attractive qualities to get others.
Supersweets tend to have tougher and thicker skins, which make their kernels less tender and harder to remove from the cob. “My mother despises supersweets,” Holmstrom said. “She finds them tough and chewy. She likes a kernel that pops like a grape instead of crunches like an apple.”
Others complain that supersweets taste more like sugar than corn, but what is the taste of corn?
To a plant man like Holmstrom, “corn should taste the way corn smells when it’s silking,” when the silks push out of the tip of the ear.
The fact is, people have trouble describing what they mean. They remember what good old-fashioned corn tastes like. But what is that, exactly?
In laboratory tests, as reported by William F. Tracy, a sweet-corn expert at the University of Wisconsin, flavor is identified by aromas released in cooking and the aroma most often described as “corny” contains the chemical compound dimethyl sulfide. Corn’s aroma–which has so much to do with its taste–ranges from from fruity and grainy to musty, sulfurous, fecal and rotten egglike. Somehow, this collection of aromas can be appealing, like the aromas of aged cheese.
Creaminess is a quality that depends less on corn variety than on the maturity of the ear when it is picked. Some roadside stands label their picked corn “light” or “heavy,” depending on when the farmer picked it.
Early on, the kernel is watery; later, the liquid thickens until it gets as heavy as cream. My grandfather used to cut a kernel with his thumbnail, and if it squirted “milk,” it was ripe for picking. But creaminess also depends on freshness, and even though supersweet corn will not lose sweetness during shipping, creaminess is often long gone.
Most farmers I’ve talked to prefer the middle-ground sugar-enhanced types, which balance sweetness with tenderness and that evanescent corn flavor (even if it doesn’t satisfy the nostalgia for old varieties).
Henry Smith, whose Sycamore Farms in Middletown, N.Y., supplies one of the largest corn stands at the Union Square Greenmarket, favors sugar-enhanced white Argent over Silver Queen because it matures six days faster, weathers storms better (it’s about 3 feet shorter than the 11-foot Silver Queen) and has a better “tip cover.”
The end of the ear where the silks emerge is the tip, and the tighter the husks close over it the less it can be damaged by birds.
Many farmers, like many chefs, don’t have a single favorite for eating because they want a variety of types to play with. “Of course I want the freshest imaginable corn, whatever its kind,” Page said. “But it’s like fish: I don’t want to eat salmon each time, no matter how good it is.”
But all is not lost for the uncompromising hunters of Silver Queen and kin. My current Seed Savers catalog lists 74 varieties of heirloom sweet corns, including Golden Bantam and Silver Queen. That’s down from the 300 varieties listed by the government in 1934, but I needn’t despair.
“Ten years from now we’ll still be talking `normals,’ ” said Stephen Reiners, a horticulturist at Cornell. “But maybe they’ll be sold as very special gourmet corns, valued for their rarity.”
Indeed. Just when I had abandoned my quest for Silver Queen, I came across a shy farmer from Ulster County at the farmers market. “Sure, I grow Silver Queen,” said the farmer, Bernie Caradonna. “Doesn’t everybody?”
Caradonna doesn’t grow a lot–just 8 of the 80 acres he has in corn–but he has grown it since he started farming eight years ago, even though the batch he planted in mid-May is just now ready for picking. Silver Queen takes 92 days to ripen.
“Silver Queen takes a long time getting here, but it always comes,” he said. “Very reliable, very productive–at least two ears and sometimes three per stalk. Our old-time customers upstate always ask for it. It’s got that big white ear, milky, full of corny flavor.”
As an old-timer, I could have kissed him.
Betty Fussell is a food historian and cookbook author whose work includes “The Story of Corn.”
GRILLED CORN WITH TARRAGON-CHIPOTLE BUTTER
Preparation time: 35 minutes
Cooking time: 12 minutes
Yield: 6 servings
Zest of 1 orange
1/2 cup fresh orange juice
1 green onion, chopped
3 tablespoons chopped fresh tarragon leaves
1 teaspoon anchovy paste or salt, fresh lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon pureed chipotle chili in adobo
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
6 ears fresh sweet corn, in husks
1. Combine orange zest, orange juice, green onion, 1 tablespoon of the tarragon leaves, anchovy paste, lemon juice and chipotle puree in blender. Puree until smooth.
2. Heat butter to boil in small saucepan over low heat. Add butter, with motor running, through opening in blender lid. When mixture is smooth and slightly thickened, transfer to serving dish; stir in remaining tarragon leaves. Set aside.
3. Prepare grill. Turn back husks of corn without removing; remove corn silk. Rinse ears well in water, and replace husks to cover kernels. Place corn on grill; cook, turning frequently, to gently steam, 5 to 8 minutes. Transfer corn to platter, carefully remove husks and put ears back on grill. Grill, turning frequently, just long enough to scorch slightly on all sides, 2 to 3 minutes.
4. To serve, brush hot corn lightly with seasoned butter. Pass extra butter in a serving dish.
Nutrition information per serving:
Calories ………… 270 Fat ………… 17 g Saturated fat .. 10 g
% calories from fat .. 57 Cholesterol … 41 mg Sodium ……. 575 mg
Carbohydrates …… 30 g Protein ……… 5 g Fiber ……….. 4 g
COCONUT CREAMED CORN WITH GINGER
Preparation time: 20 minutes
Cooking time: About 10 minutes
Yield: 4 servings
5 or 6 ears fresh sweet corn (to make 3 to 4 cups kernels), husked
1 teaspoon vegetable oil
1/3 cup minced onion
1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds
1 piece (1 1/2 inches) grated fresh ginger
2 cups unsweetened coconut milk
Salt, freshly ground black pepper, ground red pepper
1/4 cup finely chopped fresh cilantro leaves
1. Stand each ear of corn upright in shallow bowl; cut kernels off with sharp knife. Scrape cob down with back of knife to press out milky liquid. Set aside.
2. Heat oil in skillet over medium heat. Add onion and cumin; cook, stirring frequently, until onion is translucent, 2 to 3 minutes. Add corn kernels with liquid, ginger and coconut milk. Season to taste with salt and peppers. Heat until simmering; 5 minutes. Add cilantro and mix well. Serve hot or warm.
Nutrition information per serving:
Calories ………… 400 Fat ………… 31 g Saturated fat .. 26 g
% calories from fat .. 70 Cholesterol …. 0 mg Sodium …….. 35 mg
Carbohydrates …… 33 g Protein ……… 7 g Fiber ……….. 6 g
FRESH CORN SUMMER SALAD
Preparation time: 25 minutes
Yield: 4 servings
3 cups fresh corn kernels (from about 5 ears)
1/4 cup chopped green onions
2 small zucchini, diced
2 small ripe tomatoes, seeded, diced
1 orange bell pepper, seeded, diced
1/4 pound green beans, parboiled 2 minutes, cut into 1/2-inch lengths
Dressing:
1/2 cup packed basil leaves
1 jalapeno pepper, seeded, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons lime juice
Salt, freshly ground black pepper
1. Combine corn kernels and green onions in bowl; transfer to one end of serving platter. Place zucchini, tomatoes, bell pepper and green beans in rows across platter, until platter is filled.
2. Combine basil leaves, jalapeno, garlic, olive oil and lime juice in blender. Puree until smooth. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Pour dressing over vegetables; serve.
Nutrition information per serving:
Calories ………… 400 Fat ………… 29 g Saturated fat .. 4 g
% calories from fat .. 65 Cholesterol …. 0 mg Sodium ……. 30 mg
Carbohydrates …… 34 g Protein ……… 6 g Fiber ………. 7 g
