Where To Find Masa In Thailand?

[jaideeguy]

What I did find in the local market at the tobacco vendor was the slaked lime that is used for chewing beetle nut. 5thb/cup sized bag. Will try the masa project tomorrow and report if I get the shits or worse.

had a good conversation with rice and we talked corn, masa, papayas, snakes and peppers ......all of which he was quite knowledgable and he sent me a photo of the package of pure calcium hydroxide that I will take around to my chem supply house here in CM, but will experiment this weekend with the easily available 'slaked lime' that all public markets have here in LOS.

[rice555]

Hello jaideeguy, I found this about waxy corn. Hope your's works.

rice555

The Different Kinds of Corn

DENT corn, the scientific name of which is Zea mays indentata, is also called "field" corn. It is a corn variety with kernels that contain both hard and soft starch and become indented at maturity. It is a major crop used to make food, animal feed, and industrial products.

FLINT corn, known by the scientific name Zea mays indurata, is a variety of corn having hard, horny, rounded or short and flat kernels with the soft and starchy endosperm completely enclosed by a hard outer layer. It is similar to dent and is used for the same purposes. Most of it is grown in South America.

WAXY corn is a corn variety with grains that have a waxy appearance when cut, and that contain only branched-chain starch. It is grown to make special starches for thickening foods.

SWEET or "green" corn is eaten fresh, canned, or frozen. It is a type of corn that is grown in many horticultural varities. It is variously considered a distinct species (Zea saccharata or Zea rugosa), a subspecies (Zea mays rugosa) or a specific mutation of dent corn. It is distinguished by kernels containing a high percentage of sugar in the milk stage when they are suitable for table use.

POPCORN is a variety of corn, Zea mays everta, which has small ears and small pointed or rounded kernels with very hard corneous endosperm that, on exposure to dry heat, are popped or everted by the expulsion of the contained moisture, and form a white starchy mass many times the size of the original kernel.

INDIAN corn has white, red, purple, brown, or multicolored kernels. It was the original corn grown by the Indians, and is known by the scientific name Zea mays. It is many times seen in harvest time and Halloween decorations.

FLOUR corn, also called "soft" corn or "squaw" corn, has kernels shaped like those of flint corn and composed almost entirely of soft starch. It is known by the scientific name Zea mays amylacea. In this country we grow small amounts of blue flour corn to make tortillas, chips, and baked goods. In South America this corn is grown in various colors to make food and beer.

This information provided by the Ohio Corn Marketing Program www.ohiocorn.org

[jaideeguy]

I finally got around to doing 'my great masa experiment' this Sunday. Started a bit late as internet was down and the simple recipe I wanted to use was not available until I went to neighbor's house and got it there on line. Will try to post recipe that I used from 'Mother Earth Times' at the end of this post.

First I got a rough measure of my corn, as recipe called for a quart and all I had was litres. rough sorting got rid of a lot of sticks, husk pieces and then soaking water got a lot of 'floaters' that I removed, Then added roughly 1/4 cup of the beetle nut lime and brought it to a boil. That beautiful masa aroma told me that the chemical process was taking place. It turned yellowish from white and I let it boil for 15 minutes, then an option to sit for 4hrs or refridgerate it over night. It was late, so I chose the 2nd option.....transfering it into plastic food bags to fit our full fridge better.

Next morning was the real work.......washing, rubbing and rinsing the now swolen 4X kernels untill all skins were removed. During that long process, my mind was wandering to ideas to speed it up and I thought maybe a pressure washer would do the trick. Anyway, I did it 15 times and poured off the water with the corn skins until it was washed clean.

Next step was to grind it up. The kernels were still wet but my new grain grinder did the trick and turned out some great fresh smelling masa dough. I had a pan heated and threw the first tortilla on.

Making tortillias without a press is kind of tricky, but I finally got a process down, where I lightly oiled a couple of flexible plastic placemats and put a golf ball sized ball of masa sandwiched between and rolled it with my hand until it felt the right thickness. After the third one, I got it down, but some still stuck to the plastic and hard to remove without breaking. Will practice more......And eat more for the next three days that recipe recomends.

I put a portion aside in food bag and it's in the freezer and will try it after a week or so. Can't see where it would go bad being frozen, as tortillias come frozen, right??

Next project....tamales

The "Mother Earth News' recipe follows.......

About 1,500 B.C., cooks in coastal Guatemala figured out that cooking dried corn in alkali water removed the kernels' skins and produced a softer dough than unprocessed ground corn.

More recently, food scientists have found that this process, called nixtamalization, increases the bioavailability of both protein and niacin, and radically reduces the toxins often found in moldy corn. The resulting dough, called masa, is the basis for corn tortillas, chips, tamales and other specialty corn foods. Whole corn that has been nixtamalized is called hominy or posole, while the ground form is called masa.

Whether ground or whole, nixtamalized corn "has a taste and aroma like no other food on Earth—a delicately nutty quality combined with something almost chalky and mineral-like," says Zarela Martinez, owner of Zarela restaurant in New York City and author of TheFood and Life of Oaxaca. She shared the following recipe for nixtamalizing your own corn:

Nixtamalized Corn

2 pounds clean, dried flour-corn kernels (about 1 quart)

1/4 cup pickling lime (food-grade calcium hydroxide)

3 quarts water

Rinse the corn in a colander and set aside. In a large, stainless steel (nonreactive) pot, dissolve the lime in the water. Immediately wash off any lime that gets on your hands. Add the corn and discard any floating kernels. Bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce the heat to low, and cook uncovered for 15 minutes. Turn off the heat, cool the pot and let it sit, uncovered, for 4 hours at room temperature or overnight in the refrigerator. Pour the corn into a colander in the sink. With the cold water running, rub the kernels between your hands to rub away the softened hulls (they will have a gelatinous texture). Rinse thoroughly (some old recipes say to wash between 4 and 11 times). Drain well. Use the whole, moist kernels in soups or stews. Or, grind them through a food mill able to handle moist kernels to make masa, to which you can add enough water to make a slightly sticky dough for making tamales or, using a tortilla press, tortillas. Promptly refrigerate any unused masa, and use it within 3 days.

Mother Earth News

[JR Texas]

I finally got around to doing 'my great masa experiment' this Sunday. Started a bit late as internet was down and the simple recipe I wanted to use was not available until I went to neighbor's house and got it there on line. Will try to post recipe that I used from 'Mother Earth Times' at the end of this post.

Soi, Jaideeguy, you did it.....congratulations! But, did they taste great? By the way, no problem freezing tamales along w/ the dough. But check on the internet about the time the dough can stay in the freezer (think you can keep the tamales in the freezer longer than the raw dough).

Are you going to try using ash? If not, can you spell the Thai word (in English) for what you used for slaked lime? I want to see it in the market. What color was it?

[jaideeguy]

JR.....The slaked lime that I picked up at the local market....and I think most larger markets have a vendor that sells tobacco, candles, beetle nut supplies all from one vendor. Lots of the old Thais still chew the nut.

The wife was with me and she that asked for the slaked lime.

poon khao = quicklime (calcium oxide)

ปูนขาวธรรมดาที่ทําโดยผสมนํากับปูนเเท้ = slaked lime (calcium hydroxide) / hydrolysed lime

calcium oxide is hydrolised or "slaked" by adding water

What I got was 'slaked' already in a small bag, holding about a cup. All I can say is that it worked and only cost 5thb. or go with rice555's suggestion of ordering the cal from BKK if you are not comfortable with the locally available stuff.

[jaideeguy]

Now, what I would like to learn is how to turn my neximil [fresh perishable dough] into a dry flour. or maybe the way to do it would be to dry the processed corn, then grind it as needed.

Would be a lot more convenient, as it is a lot of prep and cleanup to do it from scratch every time.

I have a friend who has a teak furniture factory and I sent him some plans for a DIY wood tortillia press and promised him some masa if he could make me a tortillia press. He did and we'll try it out this weekend.

[JR Texas]

Now, what I would like to learn is how to turn my neximil [fresh perishable dough] into a dry flour. or maybe the way to do it would be to dry the processed corn, then grind it as needed.

Would be a lot more convenient, as it is a lot of prep and cleanup to do it from scratch every time.

I have a friend who has a teak furniture factory and I sent him some plans for a DIY wood tortillia press and promised him some masa if he could make me a tortillia press. He did and we'll try it out this weekend.

I wish I knew the answer to that, but I don't. Maybe, if time permits, I will surf the net for an answer.

It might be easier just to freeze a bunch of the nixtamal (sp?) in small bags and take them out as necessary, but I do not know how long they will be last in the freezer.

I love excellent corn tortillas.......by the way, Tacos and Salsa really makes very good corn tortillas.

[JR Texas]

Now, what I would like to learn is how to turn my neximil [fresh perishable dough] into a dry flour. or maybe the way to do it would be to dry the processed corn, then grind it as needed.

Would be a lot more convenient, as it is a lot of prep and cleanup to do it from scratch every time.

I have a friend who has a teak furniture factory and I sent him some plans for a DIY wood tortillia press and promised him some masa if he could make me a tortillia press. He did and we'll try it out this weekend.

I wish I knew the answer to that, but I don't. Maybe, if time permits, I will surf the net for an answer.

It might be easier just to freeze a bunch of the nixtamal (sp?) in small bags and take them out as necessary, but I do not know how long they will be last in the freezer.

I love excellent corn tortillas.......by the way, Tacos and Salsa really makes very good corn tortillas.

I really tried to find out how to make the masa flour......particularly how to dry the wet form. No luck! Maybe put it out in the hot sun until it cracks? I would be worried about food poisoning.

No doubt the big players have industrial machines that dry the product in high tech ovens..........but how did the Native American Indians do it? Probably they used the sun or smoke.....if you put it far enough away from a fire that might work.

If you find out, please let us know.

After all of this I am tempted to order a large shipment from the USA and call it a day..........that is probably what the owners of the Mexican food restaurants are doing........and that is probably why Mexican food in Thailand is so expensive.

[kikoman]

Hello my name is Kikoman, from old Mexico, It was interesting to see some of you-all are into masa making, I ate menudo for lunch, and tamale's for dinner yesterday. I made my second batch of Nixtamal a few days ago. I used Cal (shaked lime) with 3 cups of corn ( Given to me by my brother, who grew it in the north.) I boiled the corn for an hour, had to add some fresh hot water in the process. let it sit in the water over night. The field corn he grew was like sticky rice corn, it was extremely hard to get the covering off the corn. I need to look up a different type of corn when my brothers is used up.

You can use woodash, baking soda, and cal in the Nixtamalzation process, but using anything other than cal ,will not give the masa its unique flavor derived from cal!

The menudo was great, got the diamond cow tripe at the local market we had ordered it in advance, The tamales were different than the red chile ones, my wife roasted some long light green chiles she buys at the local market. peeled them, I spread the masa on the banana leaves from out yard, we placed ample amounts of chiles on the masa with a chunk of cheese and wrapped them up , stream them for an hour and they were great. I also made Enchiladas Chatas , prepared the masa and rolled them about the size of masa for a corn tortilla, place it between two clean cloths and pressed them with a dinner plate.

then fried it ,dipped it in homemade red chile sauce, topped with green onions, cilantro, shedded cheese and Thai lettuce.

My wife has learn to make all types of Mexican food, homemade flour tortillas, tostadas, taco's , posole, chili rellenos ,menudo etc,

Now I am looking for someone ,ican buy fresh milk off of and will go into butter and making Queso Fresco and other homemade cheeses.

If anyone knows of a place where fresh milk is sold, let me know. I live in a villiage outside of Lat Yao, about 50 kilometers from Nakhon Sawan.

Also let your wife or girlfriend ask at the local market for cal, I used a meat grinder to grind my second batch of corn, my wife used an old style Thai stone rice grinder than turned out perfect masa, she use corn I brought from Mexico. But that grinder could not grind the corn my bother grew.

[SlackJawChef]

Now, what I would like to learn is how to turn my neximil [fresh perishable dough] into a dry flour. or maybe the way to do it would be to dry the processed corn, then grind it as needed.

Would be a lot more convenient, as it is a lot of prep and cleanup to do it from scratch every time.

I have a friend who has a teak furniture factory and I sent him some plans for a DIY wood tortillia press and promised him some masa if he could make me a tortillia press. He did and we'll try it out this weekend.

Hi Jaideeguy

I haven't tried it,

But I would bet, it is best to dry the processed corn well.. then grind, If you have a fine mesh, you can screen it and get a consistent flour.. then just re-grind the big bits till it all fits through ... I can't think of any other way that would give you a consistent product..... but only grind what you will use in a week so.. think of it like Coffee... or Black Pepper...

fresh ground is best....

Congratulations... I didn't think of the Beetle nut lime.... thats what I will be using from now on....

Go on JR give it a go......it's a fun way to spend a day... it will work ... taste great.... you'll be will be wishing you tried it months ago.. Never be afraid of your ingredient's...

S.J.C

[jaideeguy]

Sorry I didn't post my last experiment with making the masa flour.

I did it just the way you suggest......dry the neximil and ground it 2X into a powder with my hand grinder. Much easier than the process of making the masa.

A friend from thaivisa has sent me some real dent corn seed....enough to make more seeds and I will be planting that soon and hopefully next year, i will have enough corn to process......

[NanaFoods]

Isn't that slaked lime that the Thais (mostly I've seen older women) use as a component in those tobacco leaf roll-ups that they chew?

[jaideeguy]

That's the stuff......can be bought at most public markets at the tobacco vendor. It's available in a white or pink paste and I used the white.....not wanting to make pink tortillias

[kikoman]

What I did find in the local market at the tobacco vendor was the slaked lime that is used for chewing beetle nut. 5thb/cup sized bag. Will try the masa project tomorrow and report if I get the shits or worse.

had a good conversation with rice and we talked corn, masa, papayas, snakes and peppers ......all of which he was quite knowledgable and he sent me a photo of the package of pure calcium hydroxide that I will take around to my chem supply house here in CM, but will experiment this weekend with the easily available 'slaked lime' that all public markets have here in LOS.

I have used the cal you have mentioned, you can find it in most Thai markets, I live out in the sticks some 50 kilometers from the nearest Big C in Nakhon Sawan. My Thai wife went to the market in Lat Yao and found it at the 1st place she inquired at.

In the Nixtamalization process you can use wood ash, baking soda or cal, but in using the wood ash and baking soda, you lose that distinct taste that cal gives to the masa.

One needs to wash out all of what ever they used from the Nixtamal before processing it to masa, I wash out the cal in about 4 clean water rinses.

Good Luck, Good Masa making!