Crunchy Roasted Hominy, Cancha-Style
Cancha is the toasted corn that arrives free at Peruvian restaurants, a bowl of crunchy golden kernels to nibble before the meal, traditionally made from a starchy dried corn called chulpe fried in a dry or barely oiled pan until it blisters. That specific corn is hard to find outside the Andes, so this borrows the technique and applies it to hominy, the hulled corn that is easy to buy anywhere. Roasted dry in a hot oven, the drained kernels shrink and crisp into something close to a corn nut, savory and loud, with no oil and no frying. The trick is drying the hominy thoroughly before it goes in, because any surface water steams the kernels soft instead of letting them crisp. Season them hot with lime and chile, the Peruvian way, and eat them by the handful.
Ingredients
- 3 cups Hominy, cooked, from dried or no-salt canned, drained and rinsed
- 1/2 tsp Cumin seed, toasted and ground
- 1/2 tsp pure chile powder
- 1 pinch Cayenne
- 1 clove Garlic, grated fine
- 1 tbsp Lime juice, fresh
Method
- Heat the oven to 425°F (220°C). Drain and rinse the hominy, then spread it on a clean towel and blot it as dry as you can. The single thing that separates crunchy from chewy is surface moisture, so take the extra minute to dry the kernels well.
- Spread the hominy in one layer on a baking sheet, no oil, and roast for 40 to 50 minutes, shaking the pan every 15 minutes. The kernels will shrink, deepen to golden brown, and turn crisp all the way through. Oil-free means they roast rather than fry, so give them the full time and trust the color.
- While they roast, toast the cumin seed in a dry pan for under a minute until fragrant, then grind it. Freshly ground cumin is the backbone of the seasoning and worth the extra step.
- Tip the hot hominy into a bowl and toss at once with the grated garlic, ground cumin, pure chile, cayenne, and lime juice. Adding the lime while the kernels are hot lets the steam pull the spices onto them without any oil to make them stick.
- Spread them out to cool, which crisps them further. Taste and add more chile or lime as you like. They stay crunchy a day or two in an open jar; a warm oven revives them if they soften.
Nutrition
Estimated per serving: 110 calories, 3 g protein, 4 g fiber, 15 mg sodium. Computed from USDA FoodData Central reference values for the main ingredients. This is an approximation, not a laboratory measurement. How these are computed.
Cost per serving is estimated from US national-average retail prices for cheap staple forms, using BLS dried-bean prices and USDA produce prices. Prices vary by store and season, so treat it as a guide, not a receipt. How this is computed.
