Roasted Corn Soufflé

I just went through the box of Thanksgiving props we store here in the Butter Flour Eggs prop warehouse. As I was unfolding the big cardboard turkey with the waffle-cut tissue paper tail, I thought back a few years to a conversation with friend who was living in London at the time.

She informed me—with a great deal of panicked surprise—that they don’t celebrate Thanksgiving over there. (Hmmm…what was it about the whole pilgrim “thing” that eluded her?) Worse, I think, was that the panic in her voice was actually centered on the fact that she couldn’t find the Durkee French Fried Onions she needed for her green bean casserole. (She had them shipped from home, a/k/a “The Year That DHL Saved Thanksgiving.”)

You can’t pick up a newspaper (or pick up an iPad to read a newspaper) without reading about the twenty-first century global economy. Yet, it seems that nothing has remained as truly American as our Thanksgiving holiday. When it comes to food “truly American” means “anything goes” – the culinary equivalent of a global economy.

Last year I wrote about the pleasure my family (of Eastern European descent) takes in eating our turkey at an old Yankee country Inn on Thanksgiving. But I know a woman, an American citizen born in China, who cannot fathom why Turkey is the anointed bird-of-the-day. “Too stringy!” says she, and truly, depending upon who does the cooking, she may have a point. Her family Thanksgiving meal is a big juicy duck. Another woman I know whose childhood was split between the Caribbean and the UK cannot imagine anything but ham on Thanksgiving, for without ham there would be no ham-on-homemade-biscuit sandwiches the next day. (Funny: throw in the homemade biscuits and her logic seems perfectly sound to me. I’m easily swayed by a good biscuit.)

I have no doubt that the real reflection of our global diversity is in the food we serve alongside our Thanksgiving main course. I am referring to the sub-group of food we lovingly call the “sides.” As iconic images go, the big roast Turkey is straight out of Norman Rockwell, but for me Thanksgiving is all about the sides. And the good news is that you’d be hard pressed to find sides I don’t like.

A couple of days after Thanksgiving we sometimes have a very informal family dinner—you could call it “Thanksgiving, the Sequel.” This is a small, very low pressure affair. Sometimes there’s a turkey, or sometimes there’s a chicken. It is more an excuse for yours truly to road test his favorite sides, and whatever turkey or chicken is there is due to my being self conscious about making a dinner comprised solely of sides –which I could very easily do if it were just me eating.

So, in the tradition of “anything goes” being typically American, I proudly present my favorite side (this year): Roasted Corn Soufflé. On paper a soufflé seems typically French, and mysteriously difficult to prepare. In practice? Not so much.

I’ll tackle its supposed French identity first. Yes it’s French, but really not so far afield from our American Spoon Bread, which is also a supple pudding and is often served as a Thanksgiving side.

More important is the reputation soufflés have for requiring advanced technique, pinpoint timing, and / or that they must be rushed from oven to table. It’s just not true. Yes, they deflate a bit if allowed to sit, but frankly soufflés sweet or savory taste better when not eaten burning hot straight from the oven. You can even reheat leftovers (if there are any) the next day. My only prerequisite for making soufflé is a Kitchen Aid (or similar) stand mixer—and that’s only because I am too lazy to whip egg whites any other way. (Go ahead, call this “lazy man’s soufflé”; I don’t care, I’ll be too busy eating the soufflé.)

By the way, just because soufflés are easy doesn’t make them seem any less magical to the folks waiting at your table. The best magicians know that magic takes a little technique, a little planning, and a whole lot of show biz. I once worked with a sleight-of-hand artist. He was so amazing that my reaction was always, “How’d you do that?” to which he would always answer, “It’s magic.” So it’s your choice whether you want to tell folks the technique behind the soufflé magic.

Roasted corn lends itself beautifully to soufflé: the roasting makes the kernels a little chewy, breaking up the flabby airiness of the soufflé.  What represents the harvest and the Indians helping the pilgrims better than roasted corn on Thanksgiving? While most sides fall into the categories of vegetable or starch, soufflé is really neither or both. It’s an egg dish with a little bit of flour added.

Soufflé ingredients are cheap kitchen basics: butter, flour, eggs, milk. For this recipe you should make sure to buy the best parmesan cheese you can find, which admittedly may bump up the price a bit.

The Butter Flour Eggs technique is that you don’t have to make a soufflé all at once, or even the same day you plan to serve it. First, you make the (lightly) labor-intense part of the recipe, then turn out the lights, go to sleep, wake up Thanksgiving morning, fire up the Kitchen Aid to whip a few egg whites and you’ve got soufflé…and yes, it’s real soufflé, not a shortcut version. (PS: this technique will serve you well next Valentine’s Day when you present your sweetheart with Chocolate Soufflé hot from the oven.)

If you decide to make the soufflé a couple of suggestions will serve you well. First, read the entire recipe all the way through beforehand, twice. Second, have all ingredients measured and all equipment ready before you start. This will help you with suggestion number three: have confidence. Soufflés smell fear. (You’ll smell cheese and corn.)

And if folks “”Oooo!” and “Ahhh!” over your big, puffy Roasted Corn Soufflé, shrug your shoulders and say, “You think this is cool? Wait until I saw my mother-in-law in half…”

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Click here for the recipe for Roasted Corn Soufflé.

Need some Thanksgiving inspiration? Read my previous Thanksgiving recipe ideas:

Alfred Lunt’s Famous Pumpkin Pie

Anadama Bread

Apple Pan Dowdy with “Baked Indian Pudding” Crust

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Write to me at the email address below with any questions or thoughts you may have. Thanks!

Let me email you when the blog has been updated! Opt in by clicking the biscotti at right or by sending your email address to michael@butterfloureggs.com

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Succotash with Cheddar Cracker Crust

One of the truly iconic images of late summer is fields of corn, to quote a song lyric, “…as high as an elephant’s eye.” True, it is not late summer yet, but, while shopping this past weekend I had a choice of fresh peaches or early fresh corn, and almost compulsively chose the corn.

(Peaches or corn? Why not both? Hmmmm. I’m not sure.)

Anyway, why my “almost compulsive” choice of corn? I think it has something to do with happy memories of summers gone by. It should come as no surprise to anyone that someone who writes a blog measures nostalgia in meals partaken.

Granted us urban folk don’t glimpse fields of corn from the windows of the subway, but I grew up in suburbia, and in an era before every available square inch had been developed, so there were frequent views of open fields as we drove by in the station wagon.

I also have a Mom who is a daughter of the depression. Like many folks who grew up in the depression she celebrates her removal from that era by practicing a certain kind of food snobbery. When I was a kid she flat out refused to serve anything from a can. Chef Boyardee? Horror. This extended to other food as well: Supermarket bread? Are you kidding? (Except of course for Pepperidge Farm, back in the day when it was a little regional bakery.) (Not that she baked her own, but that’s what the neighborhood bakery was for.) Then there were also certain table manners: the ketchup bottle was never allowed on the table. You poured a bit of ketchup into a dish and that’s what was placed on the table.

The only canned vegetables that were allowed in our house were Le Seur Baby Peas – which were so fancy that Sex And The City fans may remember the Samantha character trying to seduce a Monk by donating a can of the peas to his food drive.

My Mother was a regular at what used to be known as a “greengrocer” which was the storefront version of a farm stand. Later on when my parents moved to a slightly deeper slice of suburbia she found and frequently haunted a real farm stand.

I’d hate to think that this all sounds as though I grew up in a stuffy home with a frilly Mother who tinkled a little bell when dinner was served. That was not the case.

On occasions when she would return from the farm stand with a big bag filled with ears of corn, we would all dig in and help shuck the ears. As I was shucking corn this past weekend in my own kitchen I was struck by how easy the task is, the surprise stemming from memories of childhood when – for little seven or eight year old me – shucking corn was hard work. I also remembered all the different ways there are to cook corn on the cob. My favorite was actually learned in adulthood: shucked, smeared lightly with butter, wrapped in foil, and roasted directly on the barbecue coals.

This brings up an important point: corn is hard to ruin, its dirty little secret being that it is actually perfectly edible uncooked. True, you can over-boil it. But in the sauté pan or roasting in the barbecue coals even if you overcook it slightly it is still good, if perhaps a bit toasty.

Now, you don’t need me to tell you how to make corn on the cob. Besides that, I eat my corn “de-cobbed.” (Long story: let’s just say this is due to adventures in orthodontia that would fill a whole other blog.) Anyway, fresh corn off the cob is my ticket to a bit of culinary play time.

Succotash isn’t necessarily as summer dish, but its key player is our summery buddy, corn. Besides, if you cook Succotash, you get to tell people that you cooked Succotash. Say it. Out loud. See what I mean? And if you bring a big casserole of Succotash to a barbecue announcing, “Hey everyone! I brought Succotash!” you may garner a laugh or two. (Past performance is no guarantee of future results.)

The definition of Succotash is really wide open, the only constants being corn and lima beans. I scoured the web and found as many variations as there are kitchens. My favorite finds indicated that a cracker crumb topping was a particularly popular finishing touch. Fresh corn topped with buttered cracker crumbs? I’m at a loss for a worthy adjective. Use a really sturdy unsalted cracker like oyster crackers or Neva Betta crackers for best results. (In a pinch unsalted Saltines will do, although the results may be slightly soggy.)

You’ll see from my “recipe” that there really isn’t a recipe, more like a “how-to” guide, so feel free to adjust this to your own tastes.

Actually I added a little “zetz” to this by changing the buttered cracker crumbs to a Cheddar Cracker Streusel crust by adding a healthy handful of the sharpest English cheddar I could find. This transformed a side dish that is almost an afterthought into a really great summer meal.  Be warned: this cracker crumb crust may find its way—cheddar cheese included – this coming fall on top of apples for a really amazing Apple Brown Betty.

Stay tuned!

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Click here for the recipe for Succotash.

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Write to me at the email address below with any questions or thoughts you may have. Thanks!

Let me email you when the blog has been updated! Opt in by clicking the biscotti at right or by sending your email address to michael@butterfloureggs.com