Probably the most characteristically American thing a summer visitor
from Europe will see in our dining-rooms is the eating of green corn
off the cob. To be sure, he might see the same thing in visiting the
Hindoos or South Africans; but they are imitators, we the originators
of this delectable habit.
In saying "we" I mean Americans in the broadest sense of the word,
including the red Indians. It was they who first cultivated corn, in
the central part of our hemisphere. From there it came north, and
Columbus took it to Europe, whence it reached the other continents.
They call it maize in Europe, mealies in South Africa. In England
"corn" means wheat, in Scotland oats, those being their principal crops
respectively. In America the main crop still is, as it was twenty
centuries ago, Indian corn, which therefore is of all things edible the
most thoroughly American. Three cheers for corn!
In Italy, two-thirds of the rural population subsist mainly on corn,
which is, however, eaten nearly always as polenta (mush), alone or with
cheese, fish, or meat; whereas we have on our tables an almost endless
variety of corn and corn products.
The red man set the example. He ate green corn. He made a mush of ripe
corn, pounding it, either parched or unparched, into a coarse meal.
He mixed it diversely with pumpkins, nuts, berries, and other foods.
Succotash is an Indian name which we borrowed from him, together with
the dish it denotes--beans and unripe corn cooked together. The site
of Montreal was once an Indian cornfield. In the "dreadful winter" of
1620-21 the colonists in Plymouth bought "eight hogsheads of corne and
beanes" from the Indians, who taught them "bothe ye manner how to set
it and after how to dress and tend it."
Yet the most imaginative Indian could never have dreamt of how
amazingly their successors on the soil would multiply the uses of corn,
for the table and for countless industrial uses. We now have cook books
concerned solely with corn foods.
Mark Twain's appetizing list of the American dishes he missed in
Europe, to which reference was made in the first chapter of this
book, includes five made of corn: pone, hoe-cake, green corn on the
ear, green corn cut from the ear and served with butter and pepper,
and hominy. Among those he surely would have mentioned also, had
he happened to recall their merits at the moment, are samp, gruel,
hulled corn, or lye hominy, Indian pudding, hasty pudding, pop-corn,
succotash, Boston brown bread, griddle cakes, johnnycake, mock
oysters, cream of corn, Kentucky corn dodgers, and cornmeal gems.
Welcome as all these specialties and many others are on American
tables--fried mush and hominy are particularly to be commended to those
who know not how tasty they are for breakfast, or as a dinner course,
occasionally, in place of the everlasting potatoes--none of them--not
even genuine pone--is quite so luscious as green corn.
It may not be "elegant" to eat sweet corn off the cob, but that is the
only way to get its full Flavor. There is delicious fragrance in the
juicy cob, too, and in the bosom of your family it is permissible (and
decidedly advisable) to suck it. Sugar cane and oranges are not the
only things that are best when sucked.
American horticultural ingenuity has achieved wonders in developing
varieties of sweet corn with new refinements of Flavor. A few years ago
C. D. Keller, of Toledo, Ohio, originated a new kind which he called
the "Howling Mob," which "peculiar but apt name," in the words of Mr.
Burpee, "refers to the vociferous demand for the ears when Mr. Keller
takes them to market."
Great, indeed, is the demand in American markets, homes, and hotels for
green corn, and much ingenuity has further been expended in rearing
early and late varieties so as to make the season as long as possible.
Between the early Malakoff, from Siberia, and the late Country
Gentleman, there are dozens of desirable varieties the characteristics
of which are described in the catalogues of our seedsmen. The
last-named has long been considered the sweetest of all kinds, but the
new Golden Bantam is a formidable rival. Its color, which makes it look
like ordinary field corn, is against it, but those who have once tasted
it, sing its praises forevermore.
It is related that the Rev. Sidney Smith's parishioners did not want
him to visit America for fear that the allurements of canvasback duck
might tempt him to remain. Sweet corn, also, might have alienated his
patriotic affections. Covent Garden, to be sure, sometimes offers
so-called green corn, but England has too cool nights and not enough
sunshine to develop the Flavor of this vegetable.
Even in America, where it grows to perfection, pains must be taken if
one wants to get that Flavor at its best. All who have lived in the
country agree with Dr. Wiley's dictum that "there is only one way to
eat Indian corn. That is to go out just before sun-up and harvest the
ears, and have them boiled for early breakfast. To people in cities
who have never eaten freshly harvested Indian corn, such an experience
would be a revelation."
Not only do corn cobs that are kept a day or two before eating lose
much of their precious fragrance, but, as the same eminent chemist
informs us, "corn which is perfectly sweet and delicious at the moment
of harvest, has been found to lose half of its sugar within twenty-four
hours."
Those who find sweet corn indigestible do not know how to eat it. If a
sharp knife is pressed on each row of kernels the skin--which is the
indigestible part--is cut and remains on the cob.
While the demand for sweet corn is ever on the increase and fortunes
are made by those who grow or handle the best--that is, the most
agreeably flavored--sorts, the foods made of ripe dried corn are not
eaten so generally as they ought to be, at least in the Northern States.
It is desirable that everybody should know the interesting reason for
the fact, known to all, that the South is more addicted than the North
to the eating of dishes made of corn.
That reason is very simple: corn bread in the South is made of meal
which has more Flavor than the meal sold in the Northern States, and is
therefore more appetizing and wholesome.
Why is its Flavor better? Because it is made of ground corn from which
only the indigestible hulls have been removed by bolting, whereas in
the making of meal for Northern markets, the millers remove also the
germ which contains the fat and most of the Flavor of corn, besides
its most important mineral contents. They have contrived a diabolical
machine known as the "degerminator" for the special purpose of bolting
out the germs, that is, the very heart and soul, of the corn.
If I add that, in the words of Dr. Charles D. Woods, Director of
the Maine Agricultural Experiment Station "from the manufacturer's
standpoint the removal of the germ does not represent a loss, as it
is used for the manufacture of gluten feeds--so important for live
stock--and corn oil, which has many industrial uses and is used to some
extent as a salad oil and as a culinary fat"--the reader will begin to
suspect one reason why the millers market cornmeal from which its most
valuable constituent has been removed.
But there is another reason for this dastardly crime and that is that
"the germ lowers the keeping quality of the meal because its abundant
fat easily becomes rancid."
In other words cornmeal made for sale in the North is denatured
deliberately in order that the miller and the grocer may not run the
risk of having a few sacks of it spoil on their hands occasionally! The
consumer is not considered at all.
Ungastronomic America has meekly submitted to this outrage, largely
because the facts of the case are not generally known. Gastronomic
Americans, whose numbers are increasing rapidly, will insist on their
rights, refusing to buy cornmeal from which most of the Flavor has
been eliminated, and the North will in time eat as much corn bread as
the South.
Personally, I agree with those who think it even more tasty than wheat
bread. The only advantage wheat has is that, with yeast or baking
powder, it can be made into a lighter and more porous loaf; but this
advantage can be neutralized by baking the corn bread in thin cakes;
and corn bread thus made is far more digestible than loaves of wheat
bread as ordinarily made in America. A good quality of it is also much
more easily and more quickly made at home. Soldiers and campers prefer
it, partly for this reason. "It has been said," writes Dr. Woods, "that
johnny cake is a corruption of journey cake, and that corn bread was so
called because it could be so easily prepared on the road."[19]