Velocity or Fashion? A Meals Stylist Reveals the Greatest Methods to Lower Corn Off the Cob

Reducing recent corn off the cob appears comparatively easy till kernels go flying throughout the kitchen and rolling beneath the fridge. The excellent news: With the correct method, separating the kernels from the cob will be clear, environment friendly, and surprisingly satisfying. 

Or, actually, we must always say with the correct methods, as a result of now we have multiple most popular technique to get the job carried out. Within the video above, chef and meals stylist Julian Hensarling shares two foolproof approaches to chopping corn, every with its personal benefits. One technique shortly produces a tidy bowl stuffed with particular person kernels and is nice for banging via a number of corn directly. The opposite is barely slower however yields extra elegant, irregular slabs of hooked up kernels, which look nice in salads and different extra composed dishes.

With these two meals stylist–authorized methods in your pocket, you’ll make quick work of nevertheless a lot corn it’s essential to reduce up, and management what it seems to be like in the long run, irrespective of what corn dish you are cooking.

Technique #1: The Inverted Bowl Technique

Many cooks swear by the Bundt pan trick, by which the ear of corn is stood on finish within the pan’s heart, after which the kernels are sliced off with lengthy, vertical knife strokes. However this requires a Bundt pan, which not everybody has (and even in the event you do, do you actually need to haul it out simply to chop some corn?).

This two-bowl technique is predicated on the identical idea, however is best, and it produces a big mixing bowl stuffed with unfastened kernels. To do it, invert a smaller bowl inside a bigger one. Then stand the shucked ear of corn on its finish on high of the smaller bowl. Utilizing a pointy knife, fastidiously slice straight down the edges of the ear, separating the kernels from the cob. The bigger bowl will catch your kernels, stopping them from skittering throughout your kitchen. Observe: It may well assist to stabilize the large bowl with a humid paper material to forestall it from slipping when you’re slicing.

When to make use of it: Esquites, tacos, salads, and soups—any dish the place you need particular person pops of corn or a sprinkle of kernels as a topping.

Why it really works: The smaller inverted bowl props up the cob and lets the kernels fall neatly into the bigger bowl as you slice. It additionally lifts the ear of corn larger, serving to to forestall the knife from putting the edges of the bowl as you slice downward, which might boring and even chip the blade.

Heads up: Do not let any corn bits go to waste. Utilizing the again of your knife, scrape the size of the cob to extract any remaining kernels and all the surplus corn milk, a starchy, candy liquid that provides dishes a daring enhance of corn taste. Freeze the stripped cobs for inventory or chowders, and even ice cream.

Technique #2: Reducing Board Technique

Particular person corn kernels are nice, however typically you need bigger sections of related kernels, which might look extra nice in a corn salad and different extra structured platings. The planks of corn that come off with this technique are usually fragile, which is okay—the concept is not a lot to have huge, unbreakable planks, however as an alternative chunks of tender corn of various sizes (that mentioned, in the event you reduce extra deeply into the cob, you’re going to get corn “ribs”: lengthy, hefty strips of corn usual into rib-like items which can be sturdy sufficient to be tossed on the grill).

Begin by securing your chopping board with a humid paper towel to maintain it from slipping. Set the shucked ear of corn down on its facet on the board and, utilizing a big, sharp knife, fastidiously reduce off the kernels on the facet, rotating the ear as you go till all of the kernels have been eliminated. They need to fall off in related planks and segments.

When to make use of it: Any time you need dramatic, chunky sections of corn, whether or not in salads, soups, or glazed barbecue corn ribs. This technique is slower, so it is best reserved for occasions while you need not de-kernel 50 ears of corn.