Cornmeal facts for kids

Cornmeal

Cornmeal is a coarse flour made by grinding dried corn. It's a popular food in many countries. Cornmeal can be ground to different textures: coarse, medium, or fine. However, it's not as fine as wheat flour. In Mexico, very finely ground cornmeal is called corn flour. When fine cornmeal is made from corn soaked in a special alkaline solution, it's called masa flour. This type is used to make foods like arepas, tamales, and tortillas. Boiled cornmeal is known as polenta in Italy. It's also a traditional dish and bread substitute in Romania.

Types of Cornmeal

There are several kinds of cornmeal, each with unique features:

Blue Cornmeal

Blue cornmeal has a light blue or violet color. It's made from whole blue corn and has a sweet taste. This cornmeal is usually ground to a fine or medium texture.

Yellow Cornmeal

Most common in the United States, steel-ground yellow cornmeal has almost all of its outer husk and germ removed. This helps it last longer, about a year, if stored properly in a cool, dry place. Stone-ground cornmeal keeps some of the husk and germ. This gives it more flavor and nutrients. It doesn't last as long as steel-ground, but it can be refrigerated to keep it fresh for many months.

White Cornmeal

White cornmeal, also called mielie-meal, is made from white corn. It's very popular in parts of Africa. It's also used a lot in the Southern United States to make cornbread.

Cornmeal Dishes Around the World

Cornmeal is used in many different ways across the globe. Here are some examples:

Caribbean Dishes

• Cornmeal porridge is a popular breakfast in Jamaica.
• Cou-cou is part of the national dish of Barbados. It's served with flying fish.
• Funche is a typical breakfast in Puerto Rico. It's cornmeal cooked with coconut milk, spices, and fruit.
• Funchi (also known as fungi/fungee) is a thick cornmeal mush. It's eaten in Curaçao and is part of the national dish of Antigua and Barbuda.
• Mayi moulen is a Haitian cornmeal dish. It's often cooked with fish or spinach.

East Asian Dishes

• Tie Bing (sticking bread) can be fluffy or flatbread-like. It's traditionally cooked around the edge of a large wok.
• Corn congee (棒子麵粥) is a porridge made from plain cornmeal. It's usually thinner than grits or polenta.
• Wo tou (窩頭 nest head) is a hollow cone-shaped cornbread. It's common in northern China and may include dried jujubes.

Sub-Saharan African Dishes

Southern Africa's Nshima cornmeal (top right corner), served with three relishes.

• Tuwo masara is a dish from Northern Nigeria.
• Mielie-meal or maize meal is a staple in Southern Africa.
• Nshima or bwali is a common food in Zambia and Malawi.
• Ugali is a staple food in the Great Lakes region. It's known as sima and posho in Uganda.
• Cornmeal is also used in fufu (foufou) in Central and West Africa.

European Dishes

• Arapash or harapash is an Albanian dish. It's similar to Romanian polenta, often with lamb or cheese.
• Kachamak (качамак) is a cornmeal dish from Bulgaria, North Macedonia, and Serbia.
• Mălai is the Romanian word for cornmeal itself. It's prepared as mămăligă.
• Polenta is a very well-known cornmeal dish. It's popular in southern Europe, especially Italy.
• Banusz is a Ukrainian dish. It's made from cornmeal with sour cream and toppings like pork rind or mushrooms.

Horn of Africa Dishes

• Soor is a cornmeal dish from Somalia.
• Cornmeal is also often added to injera or lahoh. These are flatbreads eaten in the Horn of Africa and Yemen.

East African Dishes

• Ugali is a staple food in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania.
• Cornmeal is used to make both Ugali and Uji in this region.

Indian Ocean Dishes

• Poudine maïs is a local dessert in Mauritius. It's made from cornmeal, milk, sugar, and spices. It's cooled and cut into triangular shapes.

South American Dishes

Grindstones inside Mingus Mill, in the Great Smoky Mountains of North Carolina. Corn is placed in a hopper (top right) which slowly feeds it into the grindstone (center). The grindstone grinds the corn into cornmeal, and empties it into a bucket (lower left). The grindstones are turned by the mill's water-powered turbine.

• Masarepa is soaked and cooked corn, ground into a fine flour. It's used in Venezuela and Colombia for arepas and empanadas.
• Polenta is also a typical dish in many South American countries. These include Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay.

North American Dishes

A corn muffin.

• Masa or Masa harina is specially treated corn used for tamales and tortillas. It's common in Central America, Mexico, and South America.
• Cornmeal is used as a batter for fried foods like corn dogs.
• It's made into breads such as cornbread, hushpuppies, and jonnycakes.
• It serves as breading for fried or baked foods, like fried fish.
• Cornmeal is an ingredient in some breakfast cereals.
• It's used in cheese curl type snack foods, like Cheetos.
• It's found in corn chips such as Fritos.
• Cornmeal can be used as a release agent to stop breads and pizza from sticking to pans.
• It's the main ingredient for grits.
• It's made into a porridge called cornmeal mush. This mush is often sliced and grilled.
• In colonial times, cornmeal was known as "samp" and used as a kind of porridge.

South Asian Dishes

• Makki di roti is a traditional Punjabi bread. It's often eaten with saag in northern India and eastern Pakistan.
• In parts of northern India and Pakistan, ground corn flour is used to make thick bread. This bread can be eaten with curries or with yogurt.