More tips for cleaning your corn

With the combination of heat and rain, corn is piled high at markets. That might explain the sudden explosion of tips for cleaning and cooking corn:

1. The corn-shaking video. A slightly corny guy named Ken has gone viral, racking up more than 6 million hits on You Tube for his video of microwaving corn and shaking it out of the husk. (I think at least half of those 6 million are from people who have forwarded it to me.)

Does it work? I've tried it a couple of times and my corn doesn't shake free like Ken's. But it is easy to remove the husk and then rub the hot ear with a paper towel to remove the silks. So it is handy as a method to keep from heating up your kitchen with a pot of boiling water.



2. Cooking corn in a cooler. This one started making the rounds last summer: You cook corn for a crowd by piling shucked, raw ears in a cooler, pouring in boiling water, closing the cooler and letting it sit for 30 minutes. It does work, of course. However, some sources have pointed out that coolers aren't intended to hold hot water, and exposing the inner liners to heat could cause chemicals to leach from the plastic. On the other hand, there probably aren't that many times you'd have a large enough gathering to use this trick, so your exposure would be limited.

3. If you missed it, we ran a blog tip from a reader earlier in the summer on grilling corn in the husk and then steaming it in a paper bag until the husk and silk slips off. It's really an outdoor version of corny Ken's video and makes me wonder what would happen if you combined the two. Would the corn jump out of the husk all by itself?

Got any corn tips or tales of trying any of these tricks? Pass 'em on. Corn season won't be with us much longer.