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I've had some grilled white corn in some parts in south Mexico, prepared in different ways, they're all pretty good and none are sweet, I've been looking to grow some but most of the seeds I find say sweet corn, anyone know what kind they are? Some searching led me to hickory king, is that a good candidate or what other options are there (that are not the result of human tampering :)

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    Just because something is labelled "sweet corn" doesn't mean it tastes sweet. Those are usually labelled "super sweet" somewhere. A better name for what we call sweet corn would be soft corn. The other kind of corn-on-the-cob we called "cow corn" as children because it's fed to them, and also ground up for cornmeal, corn syrup etc. The cobs are huge and the kernels are much harder. BTW all corn is the result of human tampering, going back to the Inca Commented Sep 23, 2012 at 17:24
  • ok so they call all corn sweet corn in the US? weird but ok, and by tampering i was referring more to monsanto style tampering
    – geermc4
    Commented Sep 24, 2012 at 17:17
  • Indeed, ancient corn bears almost no resemblance to modern corn. It "evolved" from a wild grass called Teosinite. learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/selection/corn
    – Brian
    Commented Mar 23, 2014 at 11:10

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Some white non-supersweet corn varieties I know of that regularly get high marks for flavor when picked in the milk stage are Stowell's Evergreen and Country Gentleman. I've grown these at one time or another and thought they were very tasty (I also don't like the new super sweet varieties - they just don't taste like corn to me...) These varieties are also open pollinated, meaning you can save seed from them for next year if you only grow one variety or if you isolate the plants in some fashion (look up seed saving, corn, for details - I think Seedsavers.org has a good set of tutorials.) Silver Queen is an older hybrid type that is sweeter than many older open pollinated types, but not nearly as sweet as the new super sweet sugary hybrids, so you might try that one as well, even though the seed won't save true.

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