Recipe: Corn Pudding

by John Ryan

Corn Pudding

A vegetable custard, that's what this is. Prepared as it is here, the pudding is the ultimate comfort food, but follow the basic proportions and you can do what you want. Throw in a bit of dill weed, snipped chives, minced jalapeño, maybe some diced tomatoes, diced ham, crumbled bacon...your appetite will lead you.

This is a warm and delicious thing to sit down to on a brisk autumn night. While it is usually served as a side dish, I find that a green salad, corn pudding, and a glass of white wine makes a fine dinner.

You need...
1-1/2 hours
Blender or food processor
Pan for a water bath
350 degree F. oven

3 ears of corn (about 1-1/2 cups kernels or 10 ounces)
2 cups milk
3 eggs
2 tablespoons butter
1/4 cup cornmeal
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper

1. Turn your oven on to 350 degrees F. Cut the kernels from the ears. purée the corn with about 1/4 cup of the milk. Scrape it into a mixing bowl and whisk the eggs in.

2. Bring the rest of the milk and the butter to a simmer. Whisk in the cornmeal, salt and pepper. Let it simmer a minute then take it off the heat and whisk it into the puréed corn.

3. Butter a baking dish and pour the mixture into it. Put the baking dish in a water bath and bake in the oven until a knife poked into the middle comes out clean—45 minutes to an hour.

Notes

A water bath is a pan of water. It's the gentlest way to cook custard. To make a water bath, put the custard dish in a pan, then pour water around the custard dish and carefully put it in the oven. The deeper the bath, the more effective it is, but don't get carried away. Also, if you fill the bath with hot water, the custard will cook more quickly than if you fill it with cold water.