I just read a thread where someone complained about the smell of burnt popcorn.
I don’t make popcorn at work, but when I make it at home, I love it when about half of the kernels are in that weird, indeterminate state between normal and burnt. Greyish brown and powdery, with a touch of farm-fresh butter!
On the stove, I’ll leave the pan on just about 10-15 seconds after I hear the popping stop, and I get a nice little bundle of browned/slightly blackened stuff at the bottom.
And, thanks to my superior culinary improvisational skills, I’ve also learned that if you just use a little less oil than you normally would, you’ll still get a goodly number of half-popped, cracked open seeds.
All that, coated in yummery buttery goodness with too much salt.
First person to say chlesterol gets bonked with my Whirley Pop TM
Thanks to the prevalence of corn down here (and potatoes, but that’s another story), Peruvians have developed hundreds of corn-based snacks. Currently my leading favorites are canchitas saladas, which are basically large corn kernels roasted until the insides pop and become powdery/dry/popcorny; but the outsides stay kerneled with a thin veneer of shell; and andinos, which can be best described as Corn Nuts on steroids – each one is about the size of a quarter or even half-dollar and are slightly lighter and crispier than U.S. corn nuts.
The half popped duds and the slightly singed kernels are wunnerful. However, the totally blackened ones are disgusting beyond what anybody should ever have to deal with.
False_God what you are describing sounds like its worth the price of a plane ticket to Peru alone.