My green dent corn grew quite quickly, though the yield was pretty poor. When I picked this first ripe ear and peeled back the silk, I was amazed. Look at all those colors! A little purple, a little yellow, some blue, some green… and the cob is pale red. Amazing.
The experiment was a success despite a poor harvest, since now I have plenty of seed for next year. I started with only 200 kernels from the USDA (PI 452039) germplasm repository. I’m going to space them further apart next spring and see if they do better. If not, I may mix the breed with Oaxacan green dent, though I don’t think that cultivar is quite as pretty as this one.
Next test: grinding and eating a sample of the grain. I’m hoping they taste as great as they look.
Next season, I’ll plant a much bigger patch and then save seeds from the very best of the lot. Started with such a limited population is not a good practice, particularly for corn. I can’t wait for 2014!
6 responses to “First ear of green dent corn”
nice but corny background, amigo :)
Monsanto wept.
So how did it taste? How did you use it?
Good question! This is a grain corn, meaning it should be good for making flour and grits. I love grits, so I'm planning on roughly grinding it and cooking some.
Our complete yield off this patch was perhaps 1 quart of seed. I'm going to grind a little teeny bit of that to try… I'll post what it tastes like when I get a chance.
We grew Hickory King dent corn in TN and made our own grits from it: they tasted amazing. The corn flavor was rich and pronounced.
Hi, I was wondering if you planed the green dent corn again in 2014 and/or 2015? Thank you!
No – the yields were quite low so I switched to testing some other types.