How to Process Corn Seed
Corn oil, like other vegetable based oils, is made from the processing of vegetable seed to extract natural oils. This is usually accomplished at a large scale with industrial-grade presses. However, corn oil can be made at home with a smaller manual press and a bit of elbow-grease. A few steps are required to process corn seed into oil, but the result will be all natural, organic oil for use in cooking and food preparation. Does this Spark an idea?
Things You'll Need
- Corn
- Several large buckets
- Screw press
- Mesh screens
- Sieve or strainer
- Jars
Instructions
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1
Fill half of a clean bucket with water. The water should be filtered or distilled to reduce sediment content to avoid contaminating your processed corn oil.
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2
Strip corn kernels off of the cob. Clean the seeds of all chaff and excess plant material, place them in a strainer, and rinse thoroughly. The cleaner the seed, the more pure the result will be. Excess plant material can also clog your press, leading to frequent cleanings.
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3
Feed the cleaned seeds into a screw press and engage the press, using the hand crank or electric motor.
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4
Remove the oil and crushed plant matter as it fills the press, and empty it into your water filled tub. The oil will separate from and the plant matter and float on top of the water.
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5
Use a sieve or mesh strainer to filter out plant mater, collecting the strained oil and water mixture in a new clean bucket.
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6
Use a scoop to skim off the top layer of oil and store in a container. Cover the remaining water and oil mixture with a mesh screen cover and leave in a sunny area to evaporate the water. Alternatively, you can heat the mixture on a stove at a low temperature to purify the oil of any remaining water.
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Store your oil in an airtight jar, and keep in a cool, dark place for best shelf life.
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Tips & Warnings
The most oil-rich part of corn seed is the inner endosperm. Cracking and removing the outer hull of the kernel will produce higher quality oil, but will require extra preparation.
Processing corn seed is a labor intensive process that requires a great amount of seed to produce a small amount of oil--56 pounds of corn yield only about 1.6 pounds of oil. If you need a large batch of oil, this should be taken into consideration.
