During a radio interview with James Ooi of Little Bao Boy fame (he does video guides to Chinese supermarkets in England), I asked him to tell me what he cooks on a Tuesday night. The answer was unexpected— a soup made of canned corn and freshly poached chicken. Sounds a bit iffy but it was surprisingly good. That exercise got our food editor, Dawn Yanagihara, thinking about canned corn—what’s in the can? The answer is water, corn, modified food starch, sugar and salt (not necessarily in that order). Cream? It’s nowhere to be found—which explains why manufacturers call it “cream-style” corn. It also explains why the flavor includes a good deal of saccharine and starch.

Homemade creamed corn—a marriage of crisp, fresh-cut kernels with actual dairy—is very different. Dawn admitted that she has nothing against cream and butter, but they suffocated the delicate grassiness and gentle minerality of high-season corn. So we needed a new recipe, one that was creamy but preserved the taste of fresh corn.

Cutting the kernels from fresh ears leaves behind some of the sweet, flavorful corn pulp, also known as the milk. We scraped the milk from those cobs and blitzed it in a blender with some of the cut kernels and enough water so the mixture moved with the blade. Pureeing not only releases the milk contained within the kernels, it also sets free the natural starch residing in the kernels’ endosperm that is key for thickening.

A large skillet keeps the cooking quick, which, in turn, keeps the flavors
bright and preserves the crispness of the corn. We did find it necessary to start with a few tablespoons of butter—after all, fat carries flavor— then we added the puree, the rest of the kernels and sliced scallion whites for balance. Ten minutes of cooking activates the corn’s natural starch. The result is a truly creamy creamed corn with none of the heavy, flavor-blunting fattiness of actual cream. In fact, there is no cream at all.

Chris Kimball

Christopher Kimball is founder of Milk Street, which produces Milk Street Magazine, Milk Street Television on PBS, and the weekly public radio show Milk Street Radio. He founded Cook’s Magazine in 1980 and was host and executive producer of America’s Test Kitchen until 2016. Kimball is the author of several books, including "The Yellow Farmhouse" and "Fannie’s Last Supper."