Recipe: Homemade Popcorn

Homemade Popcorn

For months now, I've been snacking on microwave popcorn.  I had a ritual: a break from work would include an episode of Star Trek on Netflix, a bowl of popcorn, and a Diet Coke on the rocks.  It was amazing.  A very good break indeed.  And then a couple weekends ago, husband and I were at his parents house and his mom made popcorn on the stove.

Homemade popcorn is SO MUCH BETTER than microwave popcorn.  SO MUCH BETTER.  I didn't know it was possible, but there you have it.  The taste is just, guh.  And it's really not hard - I mean, it's no, 'toss bag into microwave and wait for popping to slow,' but it is worth it!  So here's how to make your own.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup of unpopped popcorn kernels.  (Or as it is rightly known, corn.  I got Orville's jar of yummy goodness, but I'm sure it can't be that much different than anything else.  I mean, it's all corn, right?)
• 3 tablespoons of cooking oil.  (Your choice on what to use.  Personally, I use Safflower Oil, because that's what I have, it's tasteless, and it's very good for you.  Lots of Vitamin E.)
• 2 tablespoons of melted butter to drizzle over your popped popcorn.
• Salt to taste.

Put your oil into a large cooking pot WITH A LID (the lid is very important), and set it to medium heat.  Drop THREE kernels of corn into the oil, and cover with the lid, leaving a tiny crack for air to escape.

This would be a good time to melt your butter in the microwave.

When ALL three kernels have popped, take the pot off of the heat source, and add the rest of the popcorn kernels.  Replace the lid promptly and shake the kernels around so that all of them are coated in oil.  Set it down and count to twenty.  Letting all of the kernels reach a similar temperature will make them pop at the same time and you'll have less of a chance to burn your popcorn.

Once your twenty seconds is up, put the pot back on the burner with the lid cracked.  Let your popcorn do it's thing.  It's going to start popping.  I like to shake the contents around at intervals.  That way nothing stays in one spot long enough to burn.

Once the popping slows (just like the microwave!), take your popcorn off the burner and wait for it to stop popping.  Don't just take the lid off right away, because you'll get a faceful of hot popcorn.  And maybe oil.  Not good.  Once you don't fear for your skin, remove the lid.

Drizzle your melted butter over the popcorn.  Shake it around.  Drizzle some more.  Shake.  Drizzle.  Shake.

Now add salt and shake.  Salt.  Shake.  Repeat as needed.  Now this is where you do it to your preferred saltiness.  Taste test and add more as needed.  But remember that you can't take salt away once it's on there, so don't go overboard.

Once you've got your popcorn seasoned to your liking, put it in a large serving bowl, grab a Diet Coke and some ice, and prepare to drool over Captain Kirk, the Shatner years.  (Seriously, that man.  Guh.)