The French Cafe’s Favourite Sweetcorn Fritters

Viva
The French Cafe's sweetcorn fritters. Picture / Charlie Smith.

For this favourite, I use only fresh corn, grating half the cobs to make my own creamed corn. The result is a sweetcorn fritter that really tastes of sweetcorn, with great texture and all that natural sweetness. I like to fold through some diced crayfish meat to give them a more luxurious feel.

SWEETCORN FRITTERS

Serves 6 as a canape
Basil salt

50g / 2oz basil leaves

50g / 2oz sea salt

Preheat the oven to 60°C / 125°F. Place the basil and sea salt in a food processor and pulse together until you have a green crumb-like consistency. Spread the basil salt on a tray and dehydrate for 3 hours or until the salt is dry. Allow the basil salt to cool. Pulse to a fine powder in a spice grinder and store in an airtight container until required.

Lemon mayonnaise

2 egg yolks

1 tsp Dijon mustard

Juice of 2 lemons

125ml / 4.5fl oz olive oil

75ml / 2.5fl oz lemon-scented olive oil

30ml / 1fl oz hot water

Place the egg yolks, mustard, lemon juice and a pinch of salt into a food processor, and blend together. With the motor still running slowly add the oils followed by the water. Check the seasoning and place in the fridge until required.

Sweetcorn fritters

4 fresh sweetcorn, husks removed

1 tsp baking powder

1 egg, lightly beaten

4 tbsp flour

200g / 7oz raw chopped crayfish meat (optional)

Remove the kernels from two of the sweetcorn by holding the cobs upright with your hand and running the blade of a sharp knife down the sides. Grate the two remaining sweetcorn on the largest blade of a grater into a small bowl, add the sweetcorn kernels, the remaining ingredients and a pinch of sea salt. Gently fold the mixture together.

To finish

Heat the deep-fryer to 160°C / 320°F. Using a tablespoon, spoon the sweetcorn fritter mixture into the deep-fryer in batches of six and cook for about 2 minutes or until golden brown, drain on absorbent paper and keep warm. Repeat until all the sweetcorn mixture has been fried and serve immediately with the lemon mayonnaise and basil salt on the side.

This recipe is from Saison - A Year at the French Cafe by Simon Wright (Random House NZ, $95).

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