Freezer Corn

I'm getting close to the end of my squirrel imitation for 2010. I've stored up a lot of yummies for this winter and our pantry is running out of room!

This is the first year I have done corn. So, there may be easier and better ways out there. But, this is how I did it and it worked.

First step: Beg, borrow, and steal corn off your friend's moms
*ok, ok... I just texted said friend and she and her mom helped me pick it.. :) Where's the drama in that?

So, pick the corn and then sit on your porch and shuck it. Luckily, I found an evening where the heat index was below 110 so I was able to sit and breathe while I worked :).

While you shuck the corn, watch out for beagles who think they own the place. The one who runs this house was getting the ends that I broke off. She took it upon herself to help herself to the good, full ears while I wasn't paying attention. She's lucky she's so stinkin cute. She held it and ate it like a person...

So, take all the corn, minus the ones nibbled on by the Beag, and put it in the house. Here, I rinsed it all off, cut out the bad places and made sure the bugs were all out.

Since I waited to do this until so late in the corn season around here, I got to deal with worms. It's always nice and disgusting to find a renegade slug in your kitchen.

I then boiled my corn while it was still on the cob. Some people cut it off the cob first, but I only have stainless pots and knew I'd scorch it while it cooked. I filled up my bit canner and boiled the ears for 4 minutes. SUper easy.

Then, with tongs, the corn went from the boiling water to a sink full of icy water. I let it soak there for about 10 minutes and it was perfectly cool enough to cut off the cob by then.

*this is me pretending that this picture is horizontal even though I know it isn't... WHY do some pictures turn themselves while they are uploading?*

I used a serrated knife and just cut down each cob. I'm currently taking up a Pampered Chef order and am getting one of their kernel cutters for next year. Luckily, all our knives are so dull that they barely cut anything... but it worked great for this. I didn't get into the cob any. (you want to avoid cutting the cob too much or you have chunks of it with your corn)

Then, measure out the corn and bag it up. I found pint bags and put a heaping cup in each of them. It's just the two of us and I'd rather have to open two bags than only need half of a bag.I made sure to squeeze as much air as possible out of the bags to make them last better longer. I also labeled them with the year before they went to the freezer.

During the process, I was also canning beets and cooking salmon for dinner AND writing an essay.Like I said, I'm ready to be done with storing up for winter! But, these will be great to add to the veggie soup that I canned! (and, since I have 16 bags, they'll get added to a lot when the snow is flyin!)

Oh, and yes, in addition to the rouge bugs that will surface, this is just messy in general. There was corn on the floor (Ellie took care of that), corn on the backsplash, corn in my hair... not sure about that one still...