Homemade corn meal?

Grind pop corn!  It makes the absolutely best corn breads!

I use my Whisper Mill (electric grain mill) to grind pop corn all the time. I'm not sure a blender mill such as you've pictured would be powerful enough for dried corn. You'd be better off with a mill that is intended for grinding wheat, I think.

Maybe it can be done with a Vitamix.  Not sure if other blenders will be powerful enough to do a fine job.  If you don't have a Vitamix, a grain mill probably is a better choice. But again, you'll never know if you don't try.  If you do try please let us know of your results.

Al

I live here in Iowa, which some people call the "Tall Corn State," and it would seem remiss with my interest in using local and regional produce if I did not make my own corn meal. I get open pollinated, Yellow Dent corn from a central Iowa farmer that grows it organically. I may eventually be able to get some from the tenant who farms my land. She is transitioning it to organic. Problem here is that even though the state grows a ton (well probably millions of tons) of corn, it is pretty much all "field corn"--not only that, but a lot is with genetically modified seed and plenty of chemicals. Some is fed to livestock, some is used for Ethanol, etc.

Interesting, a few years ago, when I asked my father (who is 92, grew up on a farm, is college-educated, and a retired big-time farmer) if his mother had made cornbread and whether she bought cornmeal from the store or made her own, he did not know. Now how is that for a "successful" farmer from "the tall corn state."

Anyway, sorry for the rambling. But I wanted to establish context. When I first started grinding my own corn meal a couple of years ago, I got an "artisan" model KitchenAid mixer and a grain mill. It was a strong enough model to make corn meal. It was course, but that can be a benefit, depending on what you make with it. But one day, I tried grinding too much corn in too short of time, and the gears or something stopped working. It cost a bundle to get a rebuilt system installed.

Eventually, I got a NutriMill grain mill. At first, I had a hard time grinding corn in it, but I contacted the company, and the tech person sent a modified piece of plastic to increase the flow area. But that didn't work great. I called again, and he said to simply take out the plastic piece when I grind corn.

So all ended well. I am able to grind corn with the NutriMill. However it does quite fine meal which works well for me but may be a problem if a person was making something that called for corse meal.

And yes, I have read in plenty of places that popcorn makes awesome corn meal.