The Best and Easiest Ways to Steam Corn
I’m obsessed with summer corn. You take what Oprah thinks about bread and multiply that by three, and that’s what I think about corn. These crunchy, sweet cores of sunshine are all great things about summer foods and take very little time to cook.
Unless I grill it, which often happens due to the lack of a yard and grill, I steam the ears in the husks. Steaming gives the beans a fresh, trite flavor and makes it easy to remove the silk, which is really all you can ask of a corn cooking method. Steaming in a large cauldron is not difficult, but it does have to be monitored, and there are two other, simpler approaches you can use.
If you’re just cooking corn for a few people, use the Instant Pot.
Steamed instant corn turns out pretty quickly. As soon as the pressure rises in the stove, you will be able to chew the ears in three minutes. Simply pour two cups of water into the liner and place a steamer rack or basket inside (you just want the corn to not touch the bottom). Trim the ends of the cobs to fit in the pot (without removing the husks), and tuck in as many cobs as you can. For longer ears, it is best to fold them horizontally.
Close the Instant Pot (or any pressure cooker with steam functionality), make sure the outlet valve is in the Seal position, and press the Steam button. Use the “+” and “-” buttons to set the time to three minutes and leave, Rene. As soon as you hear the melodic sounds “I’m ready!” Screech from the Instant Pot, manually release the pressure, open the pot and claim your gold award. Remove husks and silk by cutting off the tip of the cob and removing the husks from the bottom. Silk comes off easily. (If you need / want to melt a whole bunch of butter at once – and you certainly do – just drain the water from the insert and throw in the diced salted butter.)
For corn in a large crowd, use a cooler.
Cold corn was a food hack before people used the term food hack, and for good reason it has become a classic. All you have to do is toss the whole corn porridge into the large refrigerator, add two kettles of boiling water, close and leave alone for half an hour. It’s a slightly longer process, but 99% of the idle time and you don’t need to clog the stove with a giant boiling water boiler. Regarding “leaching chemicals into your corn” – a common complaint whenever cooler corn rises – look for a BPA-free cooler, or use a giant Cambro (which is designed for storing food) or a large old pot with a lid. You just need an airtight container that can hold about 20 ears, as well as two kettles of water. (However, given that the dose creates poison, I am not worried about eating two cobs of corn that may or may not sit in the diluted solution of the extracted cooler for a while, but you do.)