Corn Fritters with Smashed Avocado and Lime

Bull In A China Shop Scarlett Bubbles

Corn fritters occupy a specific and beloved place in Australian brunch culture, which is why almost every café has a version and why almost every version is slightly disappointing. They are usually too dense, too floury, or sat under a heat lamp long enough to go sad.

The home version is better, and the reason is that you eat them within 90 seconds of them leaving the pan.

The other thing worth doing properly is the corn itself. Fresh corn cut from the cob has a sweetness and a pop that tinned corn simply does not, and given the whole dish is built around it, the difference is not subtle. Frozen is a perfectly reasonable middle ground. Tinned works if that is what you have, just drain it well.

Ingredients

Serves 4, makes roughly 12 fritters

For the fritters

• 3 corn cobs, kernels cut off, or 400g frozen corn, thawed
• 150g plain flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 2 eggs
• 125ml milk
• 4 spring onions, thinly sliced
• A small handful of coriander, chopped
• 1 teaspoon salt
• Freshly cracked black pepper
• Butter and oil for frying

For the smashed avocado

• 2 ripe avocados
• Juice of 1 lime
• Salt
• A pinch of chilli flakes

To serve

• Extra coriander leaves
• Lime wedges
• Optional: crumbled feta, or a poached egg per person

Method

1. Blitz a third of the corn briefly in a food processor, or crush it with the back of a fork. This releases the starch and gives the batter body without extra flour. Keep the rest whole.
2. Make the batter. Whisk the flour and baking powder together, then beat in the eggs and milk until just smooth. Fold through all the corn, the spring onion, the coriander, the salt and plenty of black pepper. Do not overwork it. Lumps are fine.
3. Rest it for 10 minutes while you make the avocado. The flour hydrates and the fritters hold together far better.
4. Smash the avocado roughly with a fork, leaving it chunky. Add the lime juice, a good pinch of salt and the chilli flakes. Taste and adjust the lime.
5. Fry in butter and oil. Medium heat, a knob of butter with a splash of oil to stop it burning. Two heaped tablespoons of batter per fritter, flattened gently. Three minutes a side until deeply golden.
6. Drain briefly on a wire rack and keep going in batches. Do not stack them or they steam.
7. Serve straight away, stacked with the smashed avocado, extra coriander and a wedge of lime. Add feta or a poached egg if you are making a full meal of it.

Why it works with Scarlett Bubbles

Brunch is genuinely difficult territory for wine. Most of what people drink before midday is either coffee or something so light it barely registers, and a lot of wines feel far too serious for the hour.

A sparkling Moscato at 10.5% alcohol solves that neatly. Low enough that a glass or two at 11am is entirely reasonable, and celebratory enough that it turns eggs on a Sunday into something worth sitting down for.

On flavour, the match is around sweetness. Fresh corn is genuinely sweet, and a bone-dry wine served against it will taste sour and stripped by comparison. Scarlett Bubbles meets the corn where it is, so neither one makes the other taste wrong.

Then the acid handles the butter and the avocado, which are both rich in a soft, coating way that needs cutting through. And the lime on the plate finds the meyer lemon in the glass, which is the sort of small alignment you notice without being able to name it.

If you are making a jug of something for a group, this is also the wine to pour over ice with a splash of soda and a wedge of pink grapefruit. Not traditional, but very good on a warm morning.