Picking and canning sweet corn isn't that difficult. Here's how we did ours.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
Well, after planting our Honey Select corn back in June, it's finally time to harvest and preserve that golden goodness. It's not that difficult to pick and can sweet corn, follow along and we'll show the steps.
Technically speaking, Honey Select is known as a "Triple Sweet" variety, consisting of 75% sugary enhanced (se), and 25% supersweet (sh2) kernels. It matures in about 80 days, and unlike a lot of sweet corn varieties, your picking window isn't as tight. Meaning it won't turn starchy as fast if you don't pick it on time.
2. Picking the Corn
The best time to pick any sweet corn is when the corn silks start turning to almost a black color and dried out. On this variety, the silks go from golden, then dark brown then black. The silks are the female part of the plant, which are fertilized by the pollen from the tassels. The end of the silk is where the endosperm, or kernel develops. When the ear is fully mature, the ear will consist of hundreds of kernels.
Anyways, enough botany, on to the next step, picking your corn. We planted about 175 kernels, and at last count, I think I picked about 150 full sized ears. We gave away maybe a couple dozen ears to relatives, the rest we either canned or froze. Some stalks produced a few smaller ears, but most weren't filled out and not really worth dealing with. Getting two filled out ears of corn from one plant is rare.
Here's a pic of some of our harvest for this year:
Like I mentioned earlier, you want to pick the corn when the silks are dry and dark, almost black. The ear is probably done filling out and if left for too long, will start to lose its sweetness and turn starchy. A good test is to pinch one of the kernels, if it's picked at the right time, it will squirt out a bit of a milky looking substance. The ear should feel like it is filled out fully inside the husks, there really shouldn't be any looseness felt in the ear, which indicates it's not really ready. Some ears won't fill out completely no matter what. To remove the ear, grasp it sort of in the middle of the ear and give it a good twist, that should be enough to get it off the stalk.
Here's a pic of a mature ear, on the stalk and off:
3. Shucking and Cleaning the Corn
The next step is to and preparing a place to shuck and clean the ears. You want to do this somewhere outdoors as it can be messy work. You have to find a place to discard the husks and silks and any other parts that are removed. You can put it in a compost bin, trash bin or whatever you want. I also recommend wearing some disposable gloves as working with the ears and kernels is sticky and messy business.
Shucking corn is something akin to peeling a banana, although a bit more work. It's simple, you just start peeling back the layers as you work your way around the ear, until you get down to the visible ear.
It'll look something like this, with all the silks attached and the husks down at the bottom:
Okay, now you need to take the collection of husks off by just snapping it off at the base of the cob, and discarding it. You will then have the silks to clean off. Remember, every kernel will have a silk attached to it, and you need to remove them to get a clean ear. I usually turn it upside down, and just start removing them, from bottom down to the top. You will be left with the silks hanging down from the tip of the ear. I remove the silks the same way I do the husks, just snap off the top of the ear where the kernels are decently sized. Some folks like to keep the silks for medicinal reasons, and you can if you wish, but I usually just toss it aside with the husks. Clean off all the extra silks that are left over, you can't get every bit of every silk, but try to get down as close to the kernel as you can.
Your clean ear of corn should look something like this:
After doing a few dozen ears, I kinda got it down to a process where I could get the ear shucked and cleaned off in about 2 or 3 minutes. I usually did about 40 ears at once, so it took me a good hour or two to get that many done, but it was worth it in the end.
Here's the result of my labors:
4. Preparing the Corn for Canning (Processing)
Okay, on to the next step, processing all that corn. Bring the corn it to the house, and get your canning items ready. You'll need:
Canning jars, either pints or quarts. The brand doesn't matter, we usually use Ball or Golden Harvest. Inspect them for cracks, nicks or any other defects.
Canning lids and rings. Again the brand doesn't really matter, but I prefer to use Ball or Kerr lids as they seem to seal better than other brands.
Pressure Canner, we use a Presto 16 quart version. Make sure it can be used to pressure process quarts if that is what you want to run. Corn is a low-acid vegetable, and must be processed at high pressure and temperatures.
Sharp knife, cutting board, large bowls (4-5qt should be sufficient)
Canning/pickling salt. Don't use table salt as it can cause cloudiness after processing.
Box for discarded corn cobs.
Lid magnet, jar grabber, paper towels
Disposable gloves
You should have all your canning items like jars, lids, rings, canner, etc ready before you cut off the corn. For those steps, please refer to my How to Use a Pressure Canner post for specific instructions on preparing your canning items. You'll also need a kettle to heat up some water that will be used to fill the jars after the corn has been put in them.
Okay, put on those gloves, get a sharp knife and cutting board, it's time to process all that corn. First wash off the cobs in cool water. Then, I would cut the ends of the cobs off, just so that'll make it easier to cut the kernels off. Stand the cob on end and cut down the cob, about the depth of the kernels. You don't want to cut too deep into the cob, nor too shallow. Cut down and see what the kernels look like. You may have to cut at an angle as the cob is more narrow at the top. A good guide for me is that it takes four slices down the cob to get most of the kernels. Don't scrape on the cob, unless there are some kernels you may have missed.
Put the cut kernels into a large bowl, I use like a 4-5 quart one. Dispose of the cleaned off cobs in a box or basket for later disposal. Continue cutting off the kernels until the bowl is filled or you're out of corn. Give the kernels in the bowl a bit of a massage to get them un-clumped.
Arrange your jars on the counter, and start to fill them up. Fill them to about one inch below the top of the jar, you want them fairly packed in before you add the hot water from your kettle. Add salt if desired, this is a personal preference, it doesn't affect the processing. Add one teaspoon of canning salt to each quart, or a half teaspoon to each pint. Fill the jars with hot water up to about an inch from the jar rim. Use a non metallic spoon or spatula, and push down and around the inside of the filled jar to get rid of any air bubbles. Add corn and/or water if necessary.
Clean the rims with a clean, damp paper towel to remove any residue that would prevent the lids from sealing. Grab a lid using your lid magnet from the pot of lids and rings, and place on the jar top, try to keep it centered. Take a ring using your magnet and tighten onto the jar, don't over-tighten, just enough to snug the ring onto the jar.
You are now ready to process the corn. To streamline this post, I won't be including the actual pressure canning steps. Please refer to my How to Use a Pressure Canner post for specific instructions. Whole kernel corn requires 55 minutes to process pints, and 85 minutes to process quarts. Hopefully after all that you'll have some beautiful processed corn like this:
5. Conclusion
Okay, that should about cover the subject of picking and canning sweet corn. I hope this post has been helpful for you.