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Photo of a display dad had set up at the New York State Fair in the early 50's.
My dad cured and smoked hams, bacons, etc. and smoked with corn cobs. At first with whole dried shelled cobs, then a few years later he got the local grist mill to crush the corn cobs into popped popcorn-sized pieces. But, as farmers stopped shelling their corn, shipping it whole to producers, the supply eventually dried up. Ensilage was the next best thing, but storing it was a volatile problem - burlap bags touching each other would cause spontaneous combustion. They had to be separated and there just wasn't room for that with 20 - 100 lb. bags purchased at a time from grist mills over 80 miles away after the local plant closed. I made many, many trips with my dad's old chevy truck with the cap on to keep them dry. By that time the State Inspection dissolved and reverted to Federal Inspection, bringing on a whole plethora of new, more rigid inspection laws, eventually forcing my mom (who ran the store after dad passed) to sell it; lock, stock and barrel.
But, Todd Johnson told me about Corn Cob pellets available as horse bedding at Tractor Supply, so I got right on it and got a 40 lb. bag of them. WOW! Smelling that sweet corn cob smoke brought back wonderful memories! I use them along with wood pellets (2 parts corn cob to 1 part wood) for the best flavor profile! I've used Pitmaster's, as well as Apple and Maple wood pellets, love them all! The corn cob is sweeter than all wood, giving it a distinctive sweet smoke!
