Corn picking

Well folks, I've gone from sleeping around to working a corner. Haven't stayed with any old folks all summer, but since my last post I've been doing a lot of sitting on the corner of the 4-way stop in Dallas City selling sweet corn, melons and other various stuff. Pretty good little market! Sometimes there's 2 or 3 of us crazy farmers sitting there.

We've been growing the sweet corn up at my son's on the bluff above Dallas. He suggested I try sitting there. It's convenient (dont' have to haul the corn very far) and the town doesn't have a grocery store so the people really appreciate me. I'm planning to spend the day there tomorrow. We had about an acre of corn come on about 2 weeks ago. Usually, you have a week, maybe two, to harvest sweet corn once it gets ripe, but thankfully the weather has been cool and rainy so it is lasting long enough for us to get most of it sold. I think God must like us! We will probably be done picking near the end of this week. I've gotten out of most of the picking duty by sitting on the corner while Grampa, my son, his in-laws and Jesse's friends pick. Am I smart or what??? But Sunday, I did venture into the field and took a few pics for you.

Here's the crew:



My boy is the one with the gunny sack on his head.I did manage to get a picture of him without it. Ha, Ha Jess! Here he is: Jess (my istsy, bitsy, tiny baby boy). The guy behind the trailer is Ray (boyfriend of Jesse's MIL). Ray has been selling a ton of sweet corn for us over in Ft. Madison as well as picking quite a bit. Thank you Ray! Jess has been selling a quite a bit too in the evenings down in Dallas.


This is Grampa Tom and Judy (Devan's mom). We picked 9 of these big bags in about an hour Sunday. There's about 6 or 7 dozen ears per bag.




This is Jess lugging a bag to the tractor. Glad I have these big strong guys to help!




We've been eating corn for lunch and supper almost every day. It has been so good! We try to sell it within a few days, but we've had some in our fridge for over a week and it was still delicious.

Before we went to pick new corn, we froze about 6 dozen that we had left from some we had picked around 4 days earlier.The first step is to shuck the corn and wash it. I use a brush to get rid of all the silks. It works so much better than trying to pick each of them off individually.




The next step is to cut the corn off the cob. You have to be careful not to cut clear down to the cob so we aim for about 3/4 of the kernel. It seems like a lot of waste, but for us it isn't. Our chickens love picking on these cobs.


After that I blanch the corn for 4 1/2 minutes and then cool it quickly in cool water.



Then bag and put it in the freezer! We got 8 and 1/2 quarts out of this batch. If we do anymore, I expect to get more quarts per dozen. The next corn will be better filled out than this was and even better still.


Off to bed so I can get up early and head to Dallas!


GOD BLESS YOU ALL!