Why it works: Corn and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,345 recipes. Both carry 2,3-pentanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓
Green Corn
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Remove all the silk and break off the unfilled ends of the corn cobs.
Cook
Boil the corn in water until tender.
Serve
Serve on the cob, or score the rows lengthwise with a sharp knife.
Scrape down the kernels with the back of the knife, removing the hearts without the hulls.
Stir the scraped corn over the fire with butter and salt.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.
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Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,345 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Fresh corn on the cob
- Provides the sweet kernels that are the main substance of the dish.
- Butter
- Adds richness and moisture, and carries flavour over the warm kernels.
- Coarse sea salt
- Seasons the kernels and brings out their natural sweetness.
The step that matters
Boil the corn in water until tender. Corn is ready when the kernels are tender but not mushy. Overboiling makes them tough and starchy, while underboiling leaves them chewy and raw-tasting.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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