Lateral Cooking

Niki Segnit · Lateral Cooking

Venezuelan cachapas are a type of sweetcorn pancake made by grinding fresh kernels with salt, egg and butter. The variety of corn used in Venezuela is so starchy – the kernels release a pearly liquid when pulverised – that no flour or milk is needed to create a luxuriously thick batter, stippled with nibs of whole corn. Once cooked, the pancake is folded over a generous helping of queso blanco, the mild, white, Latin-American cheese you might replace with some mozzarella or halloumi. This recipe works for the sort of sweetcorn widely available in the UK, but without the authentic starchiness, you do have to rely on the egg and a small amount of flour to make the batter cohere.