Botanic Garden sponsors lesson on America's largest crop
Submitted on August 12, 2005 - 12:00am.
Adrien M. Martin - Summer 2005
WASHINGTON – Learning the anatomy of a food strips it of its mystery. Once you know its parts, its chemical processes, economic value and its origin, the simple pleasure of tasting it somehow becomes more complicated.
Take corn for instance.
“When you hear about all the different parts of corn, all the different names of the parts, it's hard to imagine eating it,” said Ruth Levin, 72, at a recent U.S. Botanical Gardens' lecture, “A Tasty History of Corn.”
Chef Andreas Fleckenstein, who trained at the Culinary Institute of America, displayed illustrations detailing the four parts of the corn kernel: the protective pericarp, the starch-saturated endosperm, the oil- and enzyme-filled germ and the tip cap, which attaches the kernel to the cob.
Take corn for instance.
“When you hear about all the different parts of corn, all the different names of the parts, it's hard to imagine eating it,” said Ruth Levin, 72, at a recent U.S. Botanical Gardens' lecture, “A Tasty History of Corn.”
Chef Andreas Fleckenstein, who trained at the Culinary Institute of America, displayed illustrations detailing the four parts of the corn kernel: the protective pericarp, the starch-saturated endosperm, the oil- and enzyme-filled germ and the tip cap, which attaches the kernel to the cob.
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