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November 2011 PowerKids
A fun-to-make, fun-to-eat treat
Corn on the cob as an after school snack? This Indian corn-inspired fruit and cereal skewer is an awesome autumn treat.
 Ingredients:
4 T. butter
4 cups mini marshmallows
5 cups puffed corn cereal
11⁄3 cups diced dried fruit (like raisins, papaya,
cranberries, apricots)
About 10-12 popsicle sticks
About 10-12 rolls of fruit leather
To make:
In a large pot, melt butter and mini marshmallows over low heat on stove (about 5 minutes). Remove the pot from the stove and use a wooden spoon to stir in cereal and fruit. Allow the mixture to cool for about 10 minutes. Using butter hands, press a handful or two of cereal mixture around a popsicle stick so it resembles corn on the cob. Slightly moisten unrolled fruit leather and wrap it around the molded cereal mixture, making it look like corn husks. Place treats cereal-side down on wax paper until ready to eat. Makes approximately 10-12 treats.
Lend an ear to these corny facts
The top featured story this month is about the new corn exhibit at the Indiana State Museum. The upcoming holidays are a great time for families to come to Indianapolis to check out its museums, like the world-famous Children’s Museum and the state museum. If you go, here are some corn facts that you might or might not see highlighted at the “Amazing Maize” exhibit:
• Indiana is the fifth-leading corn producer in the nation. $32 billion in corn was marketed by Indiana farmers last year.
• The corn you commonly see in Indiana farm fields is NOT sweet corn — the kind you eat from the cob or from a can. Most of the corn grown in Indiana is used to feed pigs, cows and chickens.
• Livestock, poultry and dairy farmers are corn’s biggest customers — using almost 6 million bushels every year or almost half of the U.S. corn crop.
• Farmers today grow five times more corn than they did in the 1930s and on 20 percent less land.
• There are over 3,500 uses for corn. Seventy-five percent of all grocery items contain corn in some form.
• In the 1930s, a farmer could harvest an average of 100 bushels of corn by hand in a nine-hour day. Today’s combines can harvest 900 bushels of corn per hour — or 100 bushels in less than seven minutes.
• Corn is beneficial to the environment as it absorbs carbon dioxide and gives off oxygen — just like a rain forest.
For more information about corn farming in Indiana, please visit www.incorn.org.
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