I have always liked sweet corn. The Sun Prairie Sweet Corn Festival in the later part of August was a dream come true with it sumptuous, large, thick ears of corn, with deep kernels, slathered in butter and an umbrella clothes line pole with salt shakers hanging from its cords, rather than clothes. My nephew likes to hear stories of my eating sweet corn at the Sun Prairie Corn Fest. He also likes the way I can pack the ears into the now required small tote. However, as good as sweet corn can be there are different ways to eat the corn.
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| Grilled Corn, Hovel Family Picnic, 2014 T Hovel photo |
In eating an ear of sweet corn, I tend to move in a typewriter type fashion, eating along the length of the ear of corn and then repeating. My wife says I eat from right to left. My wife, on the other hand likes to eat around the ear of corn, and she does this left to right. This is called the rolling pin, or rotary, fashion. There is also the hunt and peck option, which is not in any way orderly, so leaves a good number of kernels untouched. I did a little research on ones habit of eating corn, and found that at one food site they took a poll of their workers and found that 23 of 39 eat in typewriter style. They did not say how many are rolling pin or hunt and peck. I eat corn, as one site describes, in the way most people eat corn (I am not sure what poll they based their information on). Quite frankly I was rather surprised as to its description, not about me, but about my wife. Us typewriter style eaters were described by the web site "Art of Doing Stuff" as follows:
If you eat your cob straight across like a typewriter chances are you’re pretty stable. You fold your clothes when you put them away, own a Golden Retriever and can generally be counted on to pick your spouse up from the airport on time without challenging anyone in the parking lot to a cage match.
You’re eating corn the right way. The way almost everyone eats corn.
Anyone around who’s watching you can relax and enjoy their day.
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| 2017 |
I would say I am stable and dependable, although I do not own a Golden Retriever. I think my wife would take issue with the last comment. I think she has a hard time relaxing around me, wondering what I may do next. She, however, is the one that has trouble sitting still. I can hear her now when she reads this. What does that website say about rolling pin, or rotary, style eaters? My wife, the rolling pin style eater of corn on the cob is described as:
If you eat your corn around the cob in circles it’s a clear indication you could go rogue at any minute. You’re a hippie, a wild child, maybe even an artist. You’re basically immoral and everyone watching you knows it. YOU have parking tickets. Unpaid parking tickets. And you probably drank kombucha when everyone still thought it was a poisonous alien life form.
But you’re not a complete lunatic.
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| 2017 Corn Fest. Back in my day paint brushes were used |
The complete lunatic style is relegated to the hunt and peck type who have no discernible pattern to eating corn on the cob. But, back to my wife. What is rather funny, is that my wife is likely the greatest rule follower and organized person I know. Her going rogue is about as slim as the Pope not being Catholic (although Traditionalists in the Church may disagree). While she has some artistic talents she is not a hippie, although perhaps she was a wild child in her youth, but I doubt it. I doubt she ever got a parking ticket. She did, however, go rogue just today. She seeped tea, for iced tea, in more water than the recipe called for, and diluted with less than the recipe called for, but in the end, since she is a rule follower (at least most of the time) she and the recipe ended with the same amount. Taht would, for her part constitute the amount of rebellion in her soul. The part about drinking kombucha is straight on, she was an early human life form to eat the alien mass. The scoby looks like an alien life form, and of course now she enjoys kiefer grains. Maybe, just maybe she has this repressed wild side that is fermented (pun intended) in her choice of cultured beverages.
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| Sun Prairie Sweet Corn Festival 2017 |
Now, the scientist in me, says don't rely simply on one source, so I also looked at a website called Food 52.
Old-Fashioned Typewriter:
If you eat your corn from end to end, then rotate it and repeat, row-by-row, you're probably a neat freak—and you're among the majority of the Food52 staff: 23 of the 39 respondents claimed affiliation with Team Typewriter. John M. de Castro, a psychology professor at Georgia State University in Atlanta, hypothesized that that typewriter-style eaters "live orderly, methodical lives and may be more prone to obsessive-compulsive disorders" (I'm pretty sure he was at least half-joking).
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| 2017 |
Rolling Pin:
aka Rotary Method
You're interested in the columnar nature of the corn cob, not its length. Psychologists surmise (again, half in jest) that the rotary method is "favored by creative, artistic, right-brainer folks." While the typewriter-style makes your progress enormously apparent, the rolling pin-style may obscure your accomplishments.
Others have very thought-out reasons for choosing the rotary-method: "My reasoning is this," says Eric Nager of The Christian Science Monitor: "freshly cooked corn is not uniformly hot. It cools more quickly on the edges. By eating around on the edges first, you create natural hand holds and then can proceed to eat around to the center, which cools last."
Knowing my wife, perhaps the cooling of corn is the reason in which she eats corn the way she does. Logic and artistic types seem rather at odds to me. She is a very logical person, as I hear about regularly, so she must have some logic in what is otherwise her suppressed rebel, rogue personality. She is a red head, so I should not be surprised if she has some rebel tendencies. I guess one can both be logical and have a rebellious side as a means of expression, in defiance of their logical side. If typewriter style eaters, as is seemingly suggested like the length of the ear, is there another aspect to all of this?
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| US Sweet Corn Consumption by year and pounds Source: Statista, accessed July 30, 2021 |
While eating sweet corn is a staple of Americana, showing how the nation is changing, over the past 20 years US Sweet Corn consumption has declined from 9.2 pounds per capita in 2001, 2007 and 2009 to just 4.7 pounds per capita in 2020. Given the trend in reduction of sweet corn eating, I am not sure it is fully related to the pandemic in 2020 (lack of festivals), although its slight reduction from 2019 may be. It may be related more to a health conscious population avoiding the high sugar content of sweet corn.
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| 2017, after eating you need to floss |
Sweet corn is part of the bounty of summer, and unfortunately when its season ends, it generally means the end of summer. Many road side stands sit empty after Labor Day, and then pumpkins, and fall related produce take the place of sweet corn. Corn, like carrots, lettuce and many other vegetables, and fruits (think raspberries) are better fresh. In the end, my little bit of research has provided a glimpse into my wife, and gives me a different understanding of her. I now have to be extremely careful as she can, apparently, go rogue at any time.
Unless otherwise noted, photos, 2017 Corn Fest, by Christopher Hovel (I think)
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