Sweet Corn Cake

Rich and sinfully delicious, these sweet corn cakes are very addictive. The texture of this is more like cornbread instead of cake. I got this recipe from the book  Top Secret Restaurant Recipes. I got it for my birthday. I love cookbooks as presents.

The first time I had this corn cake was at a Chi-Chi's restaurant in Erie, Pennsylvania, one bite and I was hooked. The cornmeal, corn nibblets and sugar all come together to form a combination of a mildly sweet, soft cake perfumed with the scent of corn. I have had this in every Mexican restaurant ever since.

So when my sis-in-law sent me this book for my birthday and it had this recipe, I knew I had to try it. The results was one of the most delicious corn cake ever, just like they serve in the restaurants. Try this recipe and I assure you that you will not be disappointed. This would be a wonderful addition to our Thanksgiving table. Some have even reduced the butter required in the recipe by half. I did not do that, but will definitely try that next time in efforts to make this dish a little bit healthier.

This book has a lot of good recipes and soon I will be trying the Blooming Onion recipe from Outback Steakhouse. There is also the Avocado Eggrolls from Cheesecake Factory, the Pizza Sticks and Quesadillas from Applebee's, Japanese Fried Rice from Benihana, Grilled Vegetable Sandwich from Hard Rock Cafe, Potato Cheese Soup and Strawberry Tallcake For Two from Ruby Tuesday and Hot Fudge Cake from Shoney among many other delicious recipes.

 

Serves 4 as a side dish

Ingredients

1/2 cup / 1 stick unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/3 cup masa harina ( corn flour used for tortillas etc, pic below )
1/4 cup water
1 1/2 cups frozen corn kernels, thawed
1/4 cup cornmeal  ( pic below )
1/3 cup sugar
2 tbsp heavy cream
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking powder










The Masa Harina and Cornmeal I used.


Method

• Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
• In a medium sized bowl, cream the butter with your hand held mixer. Next add the masa harina and water and beat it in.
• Add the defrosted corn and cornmeal to the mixture and mix it in. ( the recipe said to pulse the corn in your mixer a bit and then add it; I skipped this step and added the whole corn kernels )
• In another small bowl mix the cream, sugar, salt and baking powder. Add the mixture to the corn mixture and mix it all in until well blended.
• Scrape the whole mixture out in an 8x8 inch baking pan. Cover the top with some aluminium foil. Place this 8x8 inch pan in a bigger pan ( 13x9 inch ). Fill the bigger pan 1/3 high with hot water. Now put all of this into the oven. Remember only the 8x8 inch pan is covered with the foil. Bake for 50-55 minutes. I baked mine for 52 minutes. Remove from the oven and let it rest on the counter top for some 10 minutes, try and peel the foil off the pan. It is now ready to be served. Use a spoon or an ice cream scoop to serve.
• Store any remaining portions in your fridge in a covered container and just heat in the microwave for a couple of minutes before serving.