Up From the Cotton and Corn Fields of Mississippi
- ...ent corn “field corn” to distinguish it from table corn..
- The origins of corn as a crop date back to early Mesoamerican cultures, which first tamed the wild relatives of the plant to turn them into a usable food crop..
- In order to be edible, the cereal grain must be processed, typically through grinding it into a flour or soaking it in lye or other substances to soften the outer shell, as is the case in corn masa..
- Soaking the corn in lye also frees the niacin bound up in the kernels, making it more nutritious. Other varieties of corn include popcorn, flour corn, sweet corn, and waxy corn..
- The stalks of dent corn usually grow larger than the corn's sweeter cousin, and the individual kernels have distinctive dents along their sides, which led to the common name.
- The corn is often dried for processing, and is available for sale in a number of different formats including whole cobs, individual kernels, and ground flours. It may also be further refined to extract an assortment of useful compounds..
- Animal fodder often includes this type of corn as a source of nutrition, and since it grows cheaply and readily, it is often used to bulk up fodder for feedlot raising. Since the firm kernel has a variety of uses, it is very important economically, especially i....