To Steam Corn
Remove the outside husk and silk from each ear of corn. Fold back the inner husks, pick off all defective grains; then twist the husks together at the small end of the cob, and lay the ears in a steamer over boiling water. Cook fifteen minutes and serve, without removing the husk, in a napkin or on a platter.
A straightforward method that still beats boiling: the inner husk holds moisture against the kernels and keeps the sugars from leaching into water.
- The hingeLeave the inner husks on and twisted shut. They trap steam around the ear, and many cooks hold that the husk lends a faint grassy sweetness that bare-steamed ears lack.
- TimingFifteen minutes suits the older sweet varieties, which were starchier and lost their sugar faster after picking. Modern sugar-enhanced and supersweet hybrids are usually tender in 6 to 8 minutes in a hard-boiling steamer, and can turn soft if pushed much longer.
- Steamer setupAny pot with a rack or folding basket and an inch or two of water works, lid on tight. Stand the ears upright if they will not lie flat, and keep the water at a rolling boil so the pot does not stall when the cold ears go in.
- "Defective grains"This means shrivelled kernels at the tip, insect damage, or the dark shrunken tips of an underfilled ear. Picking them out through the folded-back husk is worth the minute it takes, since nothing improves them in the pot.
- Serving in a napkinA period table convention: the ears go into a folded linen napkin in a basket or deep dish, which keeps them hot and absorbs steam. A warmed platter and a second cloth over the top does the same job.
- YieldNo quantity is given. Reckon two ears per person as a side dish, and steam in a single layer rather than crowding the basket.
Corn on the cob eaten straight from the ear was regarded by nineteenth-century European visitors as a distinctly American habit, and cookbooks of the period gave it more attention than the plainness of the dish would suggest. Sweet corn loses sugar to starch quickly once picked, which is why older sources insist on cooking it the same day it comes from the garden; the twisted-husk steam method is a garden cook's technique, meant for corn walked in from the row rather than shipped.