Corn Flour America To The World

We finished the series of articles related to wheat flour. Today we started writing the cornmeal. It is fascinating to develop this theme, that is tied to our ancestral roots. Corn is a traditional culture of native peoples of America. Should know a bit about the history of corn, then get into one of its derivatives: the cornmeal. Thanks to the location of ears of corn found in archaeological sites in the Tehuacan Valley and the use of technology through carbon dating, it is known that maize was consumed in Mexico 7,000 years ago. The ears of that time were between 3 and 4 cm. long and low numbers of grains very different from those known today. Corn was the staple of the Incas, Mayans and Aztecs. Was cultivated in pre-Columbian times from Chile to Canada. Following the voyages of Christopher Columbus was when maize is known in Europe, hard to accept in principle. I arrive in Spain in 1604, thanks to its productivity and easy adaptation to the climate, then was taken in northern Italy where cultivation spread rapidly in the population's diet, getting to the rest of Europe in the eighteenth century. Maize is the most domesticated plants and plant kingdom evolved, with nutritional values ranging from proteins to the water, starch, carbohydrates, fats, minerals and vitamins. According to research, about 10 percent of this plant contains nitrogenous compounds, between 60 and 70 percent starch and sugars, and four through eight percent fat, while the remainder consists of water, cellulose and minerals. Among the proteins of corn is zein, the edestina, the Maisin and 60 parts of starch, corn only has 20, another 20 are converted into dextrin and the remaining portion, glucose and sucrose almost equally . Corn meal is a fine powder obtained from grinding the corn kernel through different methods. Essential ingredient in the preparation of various dishes of world cuisine. In Latin America is based ingredient in the preparation of traditional dishes such as arepas in Venezuela and Colombia, corn flour empanadas in Venezuela and Colombia, in Central and South America tamales, tortillas in America, but mainly in northern Central America, and other preparations, as hallacas in Venezuela, nacatamal in Nicaragua, pupusas in El Salvador, cheese balls, in Venezuela. Special case represents the polenta, a development based on corn meal, usually coarse cornmeal. It is a very versatile traditional Italian dish, which cooks the flour with water or some sort of broth or fumet. The polenta has been extended by various countries around the world including Switzerland, Austria, Cuba, Hungary, Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil, Peru, Mexico, Romania and even Japan. It has many forms of preparation and service, from porridge to a block fried. There are several known types of maize meal, such as precooked white corn flour: where corn is cooked before grinding. Is the most commercial and most practical for use at home or in the food business. It is the flour used to make arepas and empanadas, both Venezuela and Colombia. Precooked yellow corn meal: Same as above but yellow, used to make tamales, empanadas and hallacas because it gives a natural yellow color to preparations, without using dyes or annatto. Flour corn shelling: the resulting flour is boiled wheat grain with lime, to strip him of his shell, and then ground. Flour milled corn: corn is ground where even raw and cooked later. Toasted corn flour: where corn is roasted before grinding. In Venezuela there is a product called gofio canario Foror which is a type of cornmeal toast. Frangollo: Flour thick or Rolon, Canary used for a dessert of the same name. Recipe of the Week is the Italian Polenta With Mushrooms coverage, a gourmet recipe popular in Venezuela, Italy and Japan.