Korean Job Discussion Forums

[bogey666]

before you whiners think this is yet another bitching/Korean bashing post, it's not.

I'm curious - and maybe I'm missing something.

that's the best part about Dave's - usually others experience same thing and they "explain" it to clueless you (or in this case me)

so..

putting aside the cold corn they serve in restaurants (which is good but I refuse to eat it because they always drown in it mayonnaise)

I'm talking about hot corn... the one sometimes served in the streets.

in Indonesia and in the Phillippines, I got (and LOVE) a nice big stalk of corn, with the "right" flavor.. with that rich deep (darker?) yellow color.

in Korea, when I was given or bought corn on trips when buying it streetside or at a highway stop, etc.

I get something that's white-yellow... with the flavor seemingly "boiled out of it"????

people always talk about Koreans overboiling things.. is this what they do to corn?

or do they use a different kind of corn...than the one we're used to?

a corn lover would like to know.

[Bondrock]

The corn sold here is very starchy. Back in Canada and in most of the US this is known as 'cow corn' because it is used as cattle feed.

It is not the 'sweet' corn that humans normally eat.

That said, Koreans usually eat their corn cold, which sounds kinda gross, but the black-flecked corn tastes pretty good cold.

I mean it is cooked first, then chilled.

The yellow corn here is cattle feed. blech.

The white-yellow corn you mentioned is the cattle corn that has not ripened.

[Cheonmunka]

Maybe they bleach it.

Wife told me she saw a program about canned fruit. To get the skins off easily in places like Thai and Phily they put the fruit onto concrete and between that a form of bleach so let it soak then later peel the skin right off with hands.
So, she said, as the program docus say, 'Don't eat canned fruit.'

Maybe something the same with corn, bleach it so it'll last days and days ...

[ruffie]

Forgive them Lord, for they know not what they eat.

I've always wondered if this corny conundrum was due to Korean's difference in taste, or if local farmers just don't know any better. I tried asking my students once, but they had no idea what I was talking about. Most of them assumed corn was native to korea. I didn't have the heart to tell them that their only native foodstuffs were grass, bark, and perhaps rice. Perhaps one of you who is married to a farmer's daughter or son can elighten us.

[.watermelon.]

are you talking about the sticky corn that turn hard when its chilled?

[mindmetoo]

Corn on the cob in Korea looks like the corn we feed to pigs. Scrawny stuff.

[Mix1]

The corn here is not juicy at all. It's like eating wax off a stick.

When my Korean friend first tried corn on the cob in the U.S. she went absolutely crazy. "This is the best corn I've ever had in my life!" No doubt because Korean corn sucks.

I tried to tell my Korean co-workers why I didn't like Korean corn, and they just seemed to shrug it off as another anti-Korea comment.

Well, it's their loss then isn't it?

[Ya-ta Boy]

This has been discussed before. The consensus is that Koreans are serving field corn on the streets. In restaurants the corn comes from cans containing sweet corn, which has been imported.

Boiling is not the issue. If you buy fresh corn on the cob in a store and cook it at home the same way we do back home (just a couple of minutes), you get that bland, tasteless stuff. Even putting sugar in the water doesn't help. Nothing will help the taste of field corn.

It's a major disappointment. My Korean friends who've lived abroad agree--after they buy fresh corn from the farm kids in pickups in Iowa/Illinois and find out what we are talking about.

[ChinaBoy]

[blackjack]

In New Zealand we would call it maize. Which is corn that we use as stock feed

[mindmetoo]

[caniff]

[Yu_Bum_suk]

[jkamphof]

Plus on the street they cook/boil the corn in plastic bags which of course is a serious health hazard.

[Straphanger]