Martha Stewart's Tip For More Flavor In Homemade Creamed Corn
This might blow your mind, but creamed corn doesn't have to come from a can; you can make it from scratch. But if you are going to go with a homemade version of this classic side dish where the yellow veggie is the star, you should try Martha Stewart's trick. On an episode of "Martha's Cooking School," Stewart explains that once you remove the kernels from a corn cob, corn milk can be extracted from each of the indentations. To get to the milk, Stewart takes a spoon – but you can also use the back of a knife – and scrapes the pulp from each ear, moving the utensil up and down around the entire bare cob so she gets every precious drop.
Once Stewart has milked her cobs, she takes this creamy, sticky, starchy juice and adds it to the creamed corn mixture. It adds a sweeter, more concentrated corn flavor to this dish that you wouldn't get otherwise. But corn milk isn't just for creamed corn. This liquid's many properties make it perfect for a number of other recipes.
What else can you use it in?
Corn milk adds a sugary, corn taste along with a little texture that makes it an interesting addition to everything from corn chowder to creamy sauces, ice cream, polenta, and South Asian cuisine. Corn milk's sweetness is essential for chaat, which is a popular form of Indian street food, and its starchy characteristics make it a wonderful thickener. This allows you to forgo making a roux, which is why it is so great in creamed corn or as a sauce for a delicious pasta carbonara.
Experimenting with corn milk is one of the best ways to find how you like to utilize it in your dishes. But milking the corn is not the only way to get all of that goodness from the corn cob. Once the corn has been removed and the corn milk extracted, the naked cob still has a little life left in it. Some suggest boiling them in a vegetable stock to get all that rich flavor and using to for a starchy base for your soups and stews.