Corny Broth

[eternal]

I heard a great meal at Gramercy Tavern on Tuesday night so when I returned back to Seattle on Wednesday, I wanted to reproduce my favorite part of the meal (aside from a great conversation I had with a sommelier that stopped by to have drinks). The first course was a corn and ricotta cheese ravioli. The best part of the dish was the sauce it was served in. An intensely corn-y flavored broth that was both sweet and light.

To try and make this at home, I roasted a bunch of corn in the husk and then cut the kernels from the cob. I sweated some shallots in butter with a little thyme and basil. Then added more butter, chicken stock (2 cups?) and the corn. (10 ears worth) and cooked for awhile until it had reduced a bit. I through it all in the Blendtec and pureed. I figured I could use most of this for a corn soup to finish later (if you're going to roast corn, might as well roast a lot).

To finish the sauce, I sweated a shallot in some butter and then deglazed with white wine, reduced and then added some stock, reduced and then added some of my corn puree. I then went back and forth with stock and puree to try and get the texture I wanted. I thought I had a good balance but when I sauced the raviolis, the sauce turned up way to thick and had a very mustard yellow color to it, not unlike the corn puree. The color of the pasta and the sauce were one. You couldn't see the difference.

It tasted pretty good, but the sauce at Gramercy was lighter, brighter and more airy.

Any ideas on how to get to something so intensely corn flavored without taking on the thickness or color? Should I have cooked the corn in the broth and then strained it out instead of making a puree? Should I have my friend rotovap me some corn essence to use in the sauce? Did I just get the broth to puree ratio wrong? I should probably have added some lemon juice at the end to brighten the sauce and I'm sure they used some tool to foam up the broth a little (but it wasn't a pure foam).

Anyway, I have tons of puree left and I'd like to try this again. Any thoughts would be helpful, even if they involve me roasting more corn,.

[Genkinaonna]

One of the corn soup recipes I use has you steep the corn cobs in the liquid (in that case milk, but you could use a veggie stock or water) while you sautee the aromatics...I thought it really added a lot of corn flavor to the soup without the body that corn puree would add.

[andiesenji]

I think you should try corn cob stock.

The recipe on this site is pretty close to the one I have used for as long as I can remember, except I've never used thyme but do use the bay leaves.

There are numerous recipes for this, especially as a base for corn chowder where the corn is not roasted (good idea though) but cut from the cob and sauteed with onions and etc., before being added back into the corn stock. You can get a range of flavors, depending on how much the corn kernels are cooked, how much they are browned, etc.

I chop the cobs into several pieces, about 2 inches long.

Edited September 23, 2011 by andiesenji (log)

[EatNopales]

Mexican cuisine, expectedly, has 100s of dishes based on vegan corn broth (using fresh corn or dried corn).. I think I know the effect of what you want... you should cut (a portion or all) of the corn kernels & juice them.... also use the cobs in the broth.

Also skip the white wine & chicken broth (or reduce quantities).. particularly if you are using a baroque Euro style chicken broth with lots of strong herbs & vegetables (thyme, oregano, carrot) etc.,

[JBailey]

Thank you for linking to the corn cob stock. The other evening, I boiled four dozen ears of corn for vacuuming and freezing after I had removed the kernels. As I looked at the bag of corn cobs, I quickly decided to freeze them as well for a future stock...now I have a copy of what looks to be a flavorful one and am most appreciative.

Returning the favor, shortly before this task I was in Bed, Bath & Beyond and ran across a corn peeler made by Oxo. I believe this may be new to their product line. It is one of the niftiest gadgets I have bought in a long time and it makes stripping kernels an easy, clean and neat job!

[andiesenji]

Thank you for linking to the corn cob stock. The other evening, I boiled four dozen ears of corn for vacuuming and freezing after I had removed the kernels. As I looked at the bag of corn cobs, I quickly decided to freeze them as well for a future stock...now I have a copy of what looks to be a flavorful one and am most appreciative.

Returning the favor, shortly before this task I was in Bed, Bath & Beyond and ran across a corn peeler made by Oxo. I believe this may be new to their product line. It is one of the niftiest gadgets I have bought in a long time and it makes stripping kernels an easy, clean and neat job!

Thanks for the thought but I still use my 35-year-old Lee's corn cutter/creamer. Works a treat and cleans up easily - and I have some extra blades purchased with it.

(Got the cabbage cutter for slaw and sauerkraut too!)

[Tri2Cook]

I did a corn consomme with corn, corn cobs and freeze dried corn as the corn components. I reduced it a bit to concentrate the flavor, freshened it by steeping more cobs and corn then used syneresis filtering to clarify it. It had a clear and distinct corn flavor but I actually never got around to doing anything with it. It's been vac-packed and in the freezer for a couple months... thanks for the reminder to do something with it!

[Will]

I had a corn husk broth recently at Gather in Berkeley, CA. I thought it was interesting, though the soup seemed to have a little too much other seasoning in it (braggs or soy sauce, probably) which made it hard to taste the flavor. Still, an interesting soup idea, and I imagine the flavors could be good if well executed.

[janeer]

I have been making corn stock from corn cobs all my life. It is an excellent base for soups and sauces and can be reduced for intensity or made with a high cob/water ratio. I always have some in my freezer. You describe a true corn, light, bright flavor--that is what you get with corn stock.