Pan de elote

Getting over travel blues by cooking the food I discovered 🌽

¡Hola! I just got back from Mexico City. Actually, I’ve been back for two weeks, but only started feeling like myself again today. Why? Because I caught a pretty bad flu after the trip, most likely Moctezuma’s revenge. And when I came back to Montreal, it was still winter, and I felt a mixture of numbness and sadness. Something I’ve never felt after a trip. Probably because I had never escaped winter that way before.

To make myself happy again, I reminisced what I did in Mexico City by looking at all the pictures I took. It helped a lot. What helped even more was bake some pan de elote (sweet mexican cornbread). I had it at a coffee shop in Roma Norte, one of the hipster neighborhoods. What’s funny is that I ordered it by default because it was one of the only food that was available there. And now, I’m obsessed with trying to make it myself.

There are many recipes for pan de elote, and they’re all slightly different. It kind of reminds me of pudinn may (maize pudding), a Mauritian dessert that’s also made with corn. There are also many recipes for pudinn may and every Mauritian has their own way of making it. Who do I trust? All of them, I guess. Every pan de elote recipe I’ve watched on Youtube has at least a million views, so they must all be good, right? So, here’s my remixed recipe for pan de elote. It’s version number 1, which I’ll update later once I’ve experiment more. But it’s already very good, so try it!

Pan de elote

Ingredients

• 3 cups fresh or canned corn kernels

• 1 can (300 ml) condensed milk

• 1 cup flour

• ½ tbsp baking powder

• ¼ tsp salt

• ½ cup butter, softened

• ¼ cup sugar

• 2 eggs

• ½ tsp vanilla

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 180˚C (350˚F). Butter a 9 x 5-inch loaf pan and line with parchment paper.

2. In a blender, purée the corn with the condensed milk (the mixture does not have to be completely smooth). Set aside.

3. In a bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.

4. In another bowl, combine the butter with the sugar using an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Mix in the eggs and vanilla. Add the dry ingredients, alternating with the corn purée. Stir until well combined.

5. Bake for 1 hour or until a toothpick inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean.