Have you ever tried hominy or a related cereal? How about corn tortillas or tortilla chips? If so, you have loved the flavor and vitamins from the cooking technique referred to as “nixtamalization”: soaking corn in lye or pickling lime, which has been used for over 3500 years. The resulting corn product, called locally thru the names of hominy, massive hominy, posole, or nixtamal, is loaded with benefits that ordinary untreated corn can’t provide. Nixtamalization loosens the hulls to make the kernels less hard to digest and releases the diet Niacin just so our bodies can position it to apply.
Traditionally, it had the perks of preventing spoilage from insects and mold and preserving the kernels from sprouting in storage. Plus, it just makes corn flavor incredible. Making hominy is a time-ingesting but worthwhile way. There are countless variations of the approach we’ll describe right here, and you could need to make changes while you put together it relying on what sort of corn you use, how warm your lime water is even as cooking, and lots of others.
Ingredients
- 3 cups (14-oz) huge dried white corn, to be had online or in the region of information Mexican groceries
- 1/4 cup slaked lime (calcium hydroxide), available online or in strong point Mexican groceries
- 1 tablespoon lard, optionally to be had
- Kosher salt
Directions
Place the dried corn in a massive pot of slaked lime and fill it with about 6 inches of water. Bring to a boil over immoderate warmth, then reduce the warm temperature and preserve at a gently simmer, stirring once in a while, until the corn has softened sufficient to have the ability to interrupt effects, but isn’t sincerely soft, about 1 hour to one hour and 20 mins. Transfer the corn and the liquid to a large non-reactive bowl and funky to room temperature, then refrigerate for a single day (8 to about sixteen hours.)
Drain the hominy in a huge colander, then rinse very well with water, rubbing the kernels lightly among your buddies to do away with a lousy lot of the slaked lime solution as viable. Then, do away with the tough, little kernel from the pinnacle of every piece of hominy.
Bring a big pot of lightly salted water to a sturdy boil. Add the corn and lard (if using) to the water and prepare dinner at a brief boil, often stirring, until the hominy is soft and begins to burst open, about 1 to 1 hour and 20 mins. You can also want to add warm water to the pot as you put together dinner the hominy if too much boils off.
Drain the hominy and use straight away, or cool and refrigerate in an airtight area till organized to use (up to three days.)
Cooking grits, masa, corn nuts, and more!
To make grits, run your dehydrated kernels thru a food processor till they are coarsely ground. To make masa, or corn meal, you may grind the hominy freshly cooked if you’ll use it properly away for tamales or tortillas, or you could grind the hominy after you’ve dehydrated it for long-term storage. To make corn nuts, fry the freshly cooked hominy until golden and crunchy. There are many unique, splendid tactics to consume your hominy or masa: tamales, tortillas, atole (and atole de chocolate), champurrado, pozole stew, hominy bread, mote, Jamaican polenta, rockihominy, tlacoyos.