How to eat corn on the cob so you don't give the impression you're a tiny bit psychotic. 'Cause yes, you could actually be eating your corn in a way that gives people the wrong (or maybe right) impression of you. Like you didn't have enough to worry about in life.
You're at a family BBQ or street festival and you innocently pick up a piece of corn on the cob to eat. Raising it towards your mouth, butter dripping from your wrist to your elbow, you take your first satisfying bite.
So far so good. You're on track. But be careful because curious eyes are on you the moment you start your second bite. Everyone is watching to see what you do next.
You of course don't notice because you're busy concentrating on the sweet bursts of flavour, the satisfying crunch, the pillowcase sized piece of corn wedged firmly between two molars.
Will your next bite take you ...
Straight across the cob in a line?
Or around it in circles?
For this you will be judged. It's a well-known fact that how you eat your corn is the best way to tell if you're demented.
Table of Contents
Eating corn across the long way
If you eat your cob straight across like a typewriter chances are you're pretty stable. You fold your clothes when you put them away, own a Golden Retriever and can generally be counted on to pick your spouse up from the airport on time without challenging anyone in the parking lot to a cage match.
You're eating corn the right way. The way almost everyone eats corn.
Anyone around who's watching you can relax and enjoy their day.
Eating corn in a circular pattern
If, on your next bite, you choose to start going in circles, you've got trouble.
If you eat your corn around the cob in circles it's a clear indication you could go rogue at any minute. You're a hippie, a wild child, maybe even an artist. You're basically immoral and everyone watching you knows it. YOU have parking tickets. Unpaid parking tickets. And you probably drank kombucha when everyone still thought it was a poisonous alien life form.
But you're not a complete lunatic.
Eating corn like a lunatic
Those are even easier to spot. Those are the peckers. The people who randomly lift the cob of corn to the general direction of their face and wherever their mouth meets the cob, they bite.
If you eat your corn in a non-sensical pattern, you're giving a warning sign to everyone around you. One bite here, one bite there, another bite over on the other side until your corn on the cob looks like it has meth mouth.
Once anyone at the BBQ sees you eating your corn like this, you might as well get your fill of everything within arm's reach. Pack smoked ribs into your purse, dump a potato salad into your pants ... whatever you need to do, because you're not going to be invited to another grilling get together ever.
I eat my corn straight across like a typewriter. I know you were wondering. And I'm wondering about you.
HOW do you eat your corn? This is an informal poll and the information will not be held against you in a court of law. Just the court of public opinion.
Probably. But honestly, who knows these days.
Randy P
Now that I have dentures I eat it 'carefully' - lol - but yes, in the obviously superior life form manner of the typewriter. Though on occasion I will cut it off the cob so I can pan roast it in a little butter.
Tina
Since I was a tiny child, I’ve only been able to eat corn if it’s cut off the cob. To see someone eating it off the cob gives me the chills, for fear I’ll have to do that, too. I can eat ribs with my fingers, crispy bacon is not a problem, my DIL makes green beans marinated in garlic and balsamic and I can stuff those in my maw! But corn is a no-no. I don’t understand how people do that.
Jesseca
What about those that cut their corn off the cob?! We can't forget them! I NEED ANSWERS! 😅
Av8r
Typewriter. Did you know the perfect corn has 16 rows of kernels? I make my bites four rows at a time, four passes and I have devoured the corn hardly ever leaving a kernel behind. Sorry, Engineer type, I've got issues.
Karen
We all have issues, lol. ~ karen!
Jesseca
Hey! I do too!
Lesley
Typewriter all the way, but I brew my own kombucha...where does this leave me?!
frank
I eat mine around on the ends first and then eat straight across. Hmmm?
Sandra D
I think that's what I do, too - I haven't really noticed, but I will now, thanks, Karen!
Robert
What's a typewriter?
Jk
I eat it depending on the alignment of the kernels on the cob, if I find a particularly random pattern I start by making it align with the rest of the cob and then I see where that takes me.
And I take usually 1 but no more than 3 kernels at the time but all next to each other, not like the meth mouth because that's just certifiably crazy
Karen
One. Kernel. At. A. Time? I had no idea there was an even crazier way to eat corn than meth mouth or cutting it off the cob. ;) ~ karen!
Marie Anne
Love the comments as always! My comment pales in the witty department in comparison. I'm a typewriter corn eater but now will be trying the eat a circle at either end first method to create handles.
Kelli
I kinda go back and forth between No. 1 and 2, depending how how much corn is left on the cob and where it is on the cob...I'll start with the 'typewriter', then gravitate to the circular style. Maybe that means I'm just confused? Can't make up my mind? Love 'cob on the knob'...as long as it's organic, that is. :-)
Marguerite Roberts
Cripes! I have to go get some corn. I've never actually paid any attention to how I was eating it. I know there's some round and round going on, and I seem to remember a bit of typewriter sideways but I had to wait so long for the dang stuff all summer that there was maybe a bit of the wolverine gong on there, too. How embarrassing. And I though I was becoming more lady-like now that I'm staring down 70. Oh well. Guess not.
Connie
My husband eats his like a typewriter, he even knows how many rows he eats per bite (4)! I cut mine off the cob!
Pamela
Typewriter, left to right. For those who eat the ends first to use as handles, get the little corn shaped holders that you stick in both ends. Don’t think I have ever eaten corn on the cob without them.
Darlene
I am in trouble again! Non-Sensical corn eater, yup, sometimes I just follow the flow of the butter, or not.
Love your article Karen.
on another note....
I am happy to say, here in Nova Scotia our veggie garden survived Hurricane Dorian yesterday, although looking a bit rough, couple broken sunflowers and a willow tree destroyed but my leeks, tomatoes and all other veggies in tact.
Karen
Uh oh! Willow down! Well, considering the storm, you've done O.K. Amazing the garden survived! ~ karen!
Tina
I had a willow break in a storm once! My neighbor was an arborist. He said to gather up all the rattle cans of spray paint and spray them into the crack of the willow. Let the paint ooze down into the crack and then leave it to dry. The paint seals the crack and keeps bugs and bacteria out of it and it’ll grow back. That was 18 years ago and that tree is huge and strong!
leslie
I butter, salt and pepper it and then use a knife to slice all kernels off then eat with a fork. I had braces as a kid and this is the only way i could eat corn. I never got out of the habit 🌽
Melinda
Straight across, with speed and vigor, as if the cob could be jerked out of my hands before I have fully gleaned all...but I do love the “diva” method, where someone else has cut it off the cob and piled it before me covered in butter and salt! 😄
S
No cob, ever. Always sliced off the cob. Otherwise, the little bits get stuck in your teeth more.
Cathy McCoy
I do both, like a typewriter and in a circle. Depends on my mood and whether I’m wearing jeans or shorts. Never random. I want to get every morsel!
Kim
I cut the kernels off the cob with a knife! I have always preferred eating it with a fork.
Jamieson
I've always been a die-hard typewriter type, but lately things have shifted for me. Now I do a couple of bites typewriter-style, then shift to going all around the cob, then a couple of typewriter bites, then all around the cob, and so on. I'm still very neat and complete about it, but I've had a very busy year full of change and just like Thelma, something's crossed over in me. Or more likely I've been watching too much Hee Haw.
Karen
This higglety pigglety approach to corn seems very unlike you. You can dress it up like you're doing it in some sensical order but it's fundamentally - higglety pigglety. I hope you're O.K. ~ karen!
Laura Bee
Butter, salt & pepper. Lots. Then nibble the ends off. Then typewriter one row and wedge the others out left to right. Rolling in the dripped butter on my plate every few rows.
If there is leftover butter I sometimes use the cob like bread to clean my plate.
My laundry hasn't been completely folded and put away since 2011. Never late for an airport pick up but late pretty much everything else in life.
Daughter started out round and round but has since converted.
Karen
Hahahah! ~ karen