The Minnesota Farm Woman

Last February, my friendly local farmer sent me a notice asking me if I wanted to preorder my corn so they could have an idea of how much to plant for their customers.   Corn is a hit-or-miss crop in my own garden, and I like to have enough to can or freeze for our meals. In February, I was paging through seed catalogs and dreaming of things like summer and gardening and corn, so I blithely and rather carelessly ordered ten dozen ears. Yes, I know there are just two of us, but we really like corn, plus, all the family dinners and holiday meals are at our house, and I wouldn’t want to run out like I did last year. I thought ten dozen ears should be just about enough.  I got a call late last week that my corn was ready, as well as the ten chickens that I ordered. I like to eat locally, but not quite as local as my own chicken coop. When I got there, they had green beans, too. I have my own green beans, but it would be nice to save those to eat fresh and get a big bag of them so I can get them canned all at once. I pride myself on my organizational skills, and thought I could get this taken care of pronto, even without help from HIM, who was holding an ice pack to his wrist while watching a baseball game.  (I knew this had to be a legitimate complaint since he missed his usual Sunday morning tee time.) The shucking of the first two dozen ears was no problem, I took care of that quickly, zipped the kernels off with a well-sharpened knife, blanched and seasoned them in the oven, chilled them quickly, and into the freezer they went.   Simple enough and delicious,  but I don’t think I realized just how many  ears of corn are in ten dozen. By the time I hit the five dozen mark, my arms were aching from all the shucking, and did you know that when you cut the kernels off an ear of corn that at least 20% of them fly off in all directions?  By the time I had taken care of eight dozen, I realized that “flying off in all directions” meant that most of them ended up on my kitchen floor and when I wasn’t slipping, I was sticking. During my breaks from the corn, I trimmed and canned the green beans and made pesto,  wondering just what in the world I could have been thinking to decide to do all of this at once. By the time I got to the last dozen hours later, I think I began to hallucinate and no longer cared if the empty ears of corn hit the compost bucket or the floor. I had corn kernels in my hair and between my toes, and the smell of fresh corn was almost sickening.  Worst of all, I was out of freezer space. I mean REALLY out of freezer space, so I pulled out my trusty pressure canner and canned a few pints.  I still have a large bowl of corn in the fridge and am planning to make a pot of potato corn chowder this week. A really, really big pot.  Oh, and remember that “hit and miss” corn from my own garden?  This year, it’s a “hit”. It should be ready to pick next week.