Mexican Street Corn (Elote)

Photograph of a small shallow bowl with elote, a Mexican corn dish. The bowl is glazed in shades of blue and brown. The elote is yellow corn kernels that have been roasted until slightly brown. There is some red coloring from the spices. There is white cheese sprinkled on top. A lime wedge sits on top of the elote on the upper right. The background is a bright, deep yellow.

This is the dish I'm (virtually) bringing to the Small Web Potluck hosted by Skep and Myrtletribe.

I have never had elote, despite living most of my life in the Southwest and living near restaurants that make this dish and having the ability to find street vendors selling it. Wanting to keep with the optional potluck theme of yellow, I thought this was an excellent opportunity to try it out!

Usually when I picture elote, I think of ears of corn 🌽, fresh off a grill and dolled up with goodness. However, the dish can also be made using corn kernels instead of corn on the cob and, since I don't have a grill, that's how I chose to make it. I searched for elote recipes and used this one.

Ingredients

  1. Put the corn and butter in a skillet and roast until slightly brown. (It took me about 12 minutes but I was using frozen kernels.)
  2. Add in lime juice, spices, mayonnaise and cheese once the corn is cooked. Stir until well combined.
  3. Top with cilantro and lime wedges.

This was really tasty with a lot of flavor going on. There was creaminess from the mayo, tang from the lime, heat from the spices and some saltiness from the cotija. It would have been awesome with cilantro garnish but I chose not to use that since currently, in the summer of 2026, we are having multiple cyclospora outbreaks in the US and cilantro is one of the suspect produce items.

There are some things I would do differently next time. I made this with regular corn but I think it would have tasted better with sweet corn. Also, I used Kewpie mayonnaise because that's what I'm buying these days but this might have benefited from a more standard mayo flavor profile.

Graphic of a robin with a worm in its beak with the words Early Bird 2026 in the upper right. Graphic of a bright yellow lemon cut in half with the words splash of yellow underneath.

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