I don't know about you guys, but lately, we've been broke, so what doesn't get spent on bills goes to grocery essentials like milk and eggs, with no room for splurges on snack foods. This is just fine with me, cause processed food only tastes good until you look at the ingredients label... (And if it still tastes good after that, well...) So part of our new routine is coming up with yummy snacks from scratch. We do variations on bread, and that's great, and I've tried making crackers and things, but nothing quite satisfies cravings for something salty and/or sweet and/or crunchy like kettle corn! (in fact it satisfies all three all at once!) I don't really like buttered or plain popcorn, but kettle corn I could go nuts for (and do), but didn't know how to make it myself. Sure, a package of microwave popcorn is super easy and quick, but it is not cheap considering what popcorn actually is... Plus who knows what weird stuff is in the microwaved kind (I don't know, since I don't have any on hand, but use your imagination) After doing some research online and a few trial runs, I have successfully made the most awesome, delicious, addictive, and cheap snack food ever. If you've never popped corn on the stove (and I don't mean in one of those UFO foil thingies), there is nothing to be scared of if you pay attention to what you're doing, and the end result is even better than the microwaved kind and takes the same amount of time. And now, without further ado, but without a photo cause I ate it all before I could take a picture cause it was too damn good, my recipe for homemade kettle corn!
What you need-
A large sauce pot with a good fitting lid, preferably see through (the lid)
oven mits or potholders if the pot and lid have metal handles
about 1/4 cup vegetable oil (enough to completely coat the bottom of the pan, but not be deep)
1/4 cup popping corn
2-3 tablespoons white sugar
salt to taste
What to do-
Put the oil in the saucepan, and place three corn kernels in the pan, and turn on the heat (medium-high is good). Wait until all three kernels pop, and pour in the rest of the kernels. Holding the lid on tight, every 10 seconds or so lift the pot and shake it around to keep the kernels or any popped kernels from burning. Once about half the kernels are popped, carefully pour in the sugar (but beware as kernels might fly out of the pot if you take the lid too far off. It's best to have the sugar in one container that you can dump in all at once rather than dumping the sugar in a spoonful at a time). Adding the sugar will slow if not stop the popping, but keep shaking the pot every few seconds to help distribute the sugar and keep the kernels and sugar from burning. The rest of the kernels should pop within a minute or so. When the popping slows to one pop every couple seconds (just like when you microwave popcorn), quickly dump all the popcorn into a bowl. (It's not enough to take the pot off the heat, if you leave the popcorn in there the sugar will burn and so will the popcorn) Sprinkle on some salt and stir the popcorn around with a spoon *IT WILL BE EXTREMELY HOT!!!* Don't burn yourself on molten sugar! Let the popcorn cool a bit before you enjoy! It will be so worth the wait!
That all may sound involved, but it really isn't! The whole process takes maybe 4 minutes, and the end result is SO much better than anything out of the microwave! You can fiddle with the amount of sugar and salt, and most recipes I found say to add the sugar at the same time as the kernels, but I found that adding it halfway through the popping practically eliminates any risk of burnt sugar, while still giving an even coating. This recipe will yield a big bowl of popcorn, certainly enough for me and Wyatt to share, but if you're serving a crowd or just really really love popcorn, feel free to double it (but keep in mind you'll need a pretty big sauce pot). I'm not sure how much one bag of microwave popcorn costs, but I have a feeling it's much much more than what this recipe costs, which I estimate to be around $0.10 total. (The $2.50 bag of popping corn I bought yesterday yields 28 servings at 1/4 cup per serving (and I'm sure you can find popping corn for cheaper than that, but I happened to be in a specialty grocery store), which is $.08 per serving, plus a trivial amount of oil and sugar and salt, which I am generously valuing at $.02) I can't think of ANYTHING that you can get a big bowl of for only ten cents... Not potato chips, not even flour or milk or bottled water or rice or anything!
And if you're a crazy person and don't like kettle corn (but I can't imagine why anyone wouldn't, especially not the homemade kind), you can always stick to plain ol' salt on your popcorn, or melt a little butter, or a personal fave of mine- nutritional yeast and Parmesan cheese! (Seriously, if you've never had nutritional yeast on popcorn, do yourself a favor and go buy some! It is SO yummy (and not just on popcorn) and really good for you, lots of B vitamins!)
Now if they could only invent a popping corn that doesn't have the annoying shell of the kernel part that always gets stuck in your teeth... ;)
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