August Recipes: Sweetcorn and Saffron Carbonara Pasta
- Felicity Vincent
- Aug 23, 2024
- 4 min read
A golden, silky and delicate sauce.
This is one of my favourite sweetcorn recipes: Corn kernels are toasted in brown butter and mixed with a silky saffron sauce inspired by carbonara. A beautiful and easy summer recipe.
This pasta recipe is much easier and cheaper than it looks, and it makes a great vegetarian carbonara, as I've replaced guanciale with brown butter and corn. The recipe comes together in 15 minutes and looks incredible. The perfect quick easy pasta to impress this late summer.
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Ingredients (serves 2):
My ultimate vegetarian carbonara recipe:
1 egg yolk
0.1g saffron
2 ice cubes
20g Grana Padano cheese
20g salted butter
1 corn on the cob (or 70g - 80g kernels)
90g pasta
Sea salt
Method:
How to make my sweetcorn and saffron carbonara pasta recipe:
Place the saffron (about 2 pinches) in a bowl. If you can, crush it a bit with a pestle and mortar first. Add the ice cubes and leave it to melt and extract the delicately fragrant saffron flavour into the water.
Cut the kernels off the corn cobs.
Put the water on to boil. Add a generous amount of salt and the pasta. Cook until al dente based on pack instructions.
In the meantime, separate the egg white from the yolk. Keep the whites for an omelette, scrambled eggs or egg fried rice (you can freeze it until needed).
Whisk the egg yolk with the grated grana padano cheese, pinch of salt and saffron water.
Put the butter in a saucepan on medium heat. When it starts to foam, add the corn kernels and cook for another 1 minute.
Turn the heat off and add about 4 Tbs of pasta cooking water. Stir in the saffron mix and the drained pasta. Add more water if necessary and served up while hot and silky.
More about this sweetcorn recipe:
Keys to success:
Make sure to take the pan off the heat when adding the egg and saffron mix to avoid curdling the sauce.
Add plenty of pasta water. The sauce will start to seize up as it cools down so you should add a bit more water than looks right so the sauce stays silky and creamy as you eat the dish.
Health benefits of whole sweetcorn:
They're a good source of:
vitamin B1 (thiamin) which supports the nervous system and helps us transform food into energy.
vitamin B7 (biotin) which supports cell health and is needed to transform food into energy.
vitamin B3 (niacin) which supports the nervous system, skin health and transforming food into energy.
soluble fibre which helps lower blood cholesterol, and slows the release of energy from food. It also helps bulk stools with water and serves as a prebiotic, meaning it feeds our gut bacteria for a healthy microbiome.
insoluble fibre - helps to make you feel full, and soften stools for better digestive health. It is also associated with phenolic compounds to antioxidant properties.
Regular consumption of whole corn has been linked to a reduced risk of cardiovascular diseases and improved gut health.
Aside from all the above, beautifully golden yellow corn contains carotenoid pigments and in particular lutein and zeaxanthin.
Lutein has been proven to support eye health. It may slow down the affects of age-related vision loss and cataracts. Its anti-inflammatory properties may also support cognitive function and a decreased risk of cancers and cardiovascular diseases.
Zeaxanthin also acts as an antioxidant in our eye's retina, preventing macular degeneration.
Corn is also a good source of phenolic acids and in particular ferulic acid which has been shown to reduce the risk of cardiovascular diseases. Its strong antioxidant properties mean that it helps scavenge free radicals and reduce risk of certain types of cancer, as well as having anti-inflammatory properties. Ferulic acid has also been shown to maintain a healthy liver in animal studies. In addition to all this, ferulic acid crosses the blood brain barrier and has therefore been studied for its antidepressant-like effects.
As mentioned above already, sweetcorn contains fibre to support our gut bacteria and prevent certain types of cancer. But they also contains sorbitol which gives it some of its sweet taste. This sugar alcohol has a low GI and is not absorbed in the small intestine, therefore it can reach the large intestine to feed some of our gut bacteria which in turn supports body function and mental health. It also has some laxative effect and therefore should not be consumed excessively.
Mood Food - Focus:
B Vitamins - help the body release energy from food, contribute to higher alertness and concentration. Not having sufficient B vitamins has been linked with feeling tired;
Prebiotic polyphenols - among other benefits, our microbiome convert them to tryptophan (precursor to the good mood hormone serotonin);
Low GI - they maintain a steady release of energy to the brain over a prolonged period of time;
Hopefully this makes you excited to try this and many other sweetcorn recipes during its season!
You can find lots of ideas on how to cook with corn in my newsletter: https://felicityvincent.substack.com/
Full Video:
Cook along with this step-by-step video and learn how to make my vegetarian carbonara recipe.
Photos:
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