Southern Fried Corn

Southern fried corn is a sweet and smoky side dish featuring tender sweet corn kernels sauteed in bacon drippings.

Southern fried doesn't mean battered and deep fried. Just some down-home comfort food requiring your trusty cast iron skillet, fresh sweet corn, and 20 minutes of your time. This sweet and savory side dish would be a perfect pairing with grilled pork loin or stuffed pork chops.

Southern Fried Corn

Southern fried corn is a classic southern side dish featuring fresh corn kernels sauteed in butter, bacon grease, salt, and pepper. Sugar is occasionally added to provide a sweet contrast to the smoky bacon grease, and occasionally you will see additions such as milk to make it more of a 'creamed corn' style.

If you want to appease the purists, keep it simple with corn, fat, salt, and pepper. But there is no reason you can't add any of your favorite ingredients (even garlic, onion, and peppers) to make it fit your tastes. I won't judge you either way.

How to Make Southern Fried Corn

This is a very easy side dish to make. The butter and bacon grease is melted in a 12" skillet (bonus points for using cast iron - affiliate link) then the remaining ingredients are added. Saute over medium heat for approximately 20 minutes, or until cooked to your liking.

What Corn is Best for This Recipe

Ideally, you want to use fresh sweet corn that is cut off the cob. However, that can be difficult many months of the year. The next best choice is using frozen corn out of your grocer's freezer section. Lastly, try to avoid using canned corn if at all possible, it has a noticeably mushier texture.

Southern Fried Corn with Bacon

Bacon grease is a popular cooking fat to cook in the south, many home cooks keep a ready supply of it in their refrigerator. However, if you do not have a mason jar full of delectable bacon grease, I recommend picking up a package of bacon and frying it up to extract the grease to use in this recipe.

If you are buying bacon for the grease, you may as well use the crispy fried bacon as well. Crumpled or chopped bacon makes an incredible addition to this recipe. Use an 8-ounce package, or to your tastes.