Back Springmielies Afrikaans ፈንዲሻ Amharic Palometas AN فشار Arabic Popkorn Azerbaijani Пуканки Bulgarian Ulatih BJN পপকর্ন Bengali/Bangla Crispetes Catalan Pó'po'êho'hémâhaemenôtse CHY
| Popcorn | |
|---|---|
| |
| Unpopped corn | |
| |
| Popped corn | |
Scientific classification 
| |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| Clade: | Tracheophytes |
| Clade: | Angiosperms |
| Clade: | Monocots |
| Clade: | Commelinids |
| Order: | Poales |
| Family: | Poaceae |
| Subfamily: | Panicoideae |
| Genus: | Zea |
| Species: | |
| Subspecies: | Z. m. everta
|
| Trinomial name | |
| Zea mays everta | |
Popcorn (also called popped corn, popcorns, or pop-corn) is a variety of corn kernel which expands and puffs up when heated. The term also refers to the snack food produced by the expansion. It is one of the oldest snacks, with evidence of popcorn dating back thousands of years in the Americas.[1][2][3] It is commonly eaten salted, buttered, sweetened, or with artificial flavorings.[3][1][2][4][5]
A popcorn kernel's strong hull contains the seed's hard, starchy shell endosperm with 14–20% moisture, which turns to steam as the kernel is heated. Pressure from the steam continues to build until the hull ruptures, allowing the kernel to forcefully expand, to 20 to 50 times its original size, and then cool.[6]
Some strains of corn (taxonomized as Zea mays) are cultivated specifically as popping corns. The Zea mays variety everta, a special kind of flint corn, is the most common of these. Popcorn is one of six major types of corn, which includes dent corn, flint corn, pod corn, flour corn, and sweet corn.[7][2]
- ^ a b Matsuoka, Yoshihiro; Vigouroux, Yves; Goodman, Major M.; Sanchez G., Jesus; Buckler, Edward; Doebley, John (30 April 2002). "A single domestication for maize shown by multilocus microsatellite genotyping". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 99 (9): 6080–6084. Bibcode:2002PNAS...99.6080M. doi:10.1073/pnas.052125199. ISSN 0027-8424. PMC 122905. PMID 11983901.
- ^ a b c Gish Hill, Christina (23 October 2024), "Indigenous Foodways among Native Americans", Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Food Studies, Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/acrefore/9780197762530.013.47, ISBN 978-0-19-776253-0, retrieved 17 May 2025
- ^ a b Grobman, Alexander; Bonavia, Duccio; Dillehay, Tom D.; Piperno, Dolores R.; Iriarte, José; Holst, Irene (31 January 2012). "Preceramic maize from Paredones and Huaca Prieta, Peru". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 109 (5): 1755–1759. Bibcode:2012PNAS..109.1755G. doi:10.1073/pnas.1120270109. ISSN 0027-8424. PMC 3277113. PMID 22307642.
- ^ Smith, C. Wayne; Betrán, Javier; Runge, Edward C. A. (8 March 2004). Corn: Origin, History, Technology, and Production. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-0-471-41184-0.
- ^ Rafferty, Sean (4 July 2024). "How popcorn was discovered nearly 7,000 years ago". Live Science. Retrieved 17 May 2025.
- ^ Michelle Higgins (5 May 2017). "How Popcorn Pops". Thoughtco.com.
- ^ Linda Campbell Franklin, "Corn", in Andrew F. Smith (ed.), The Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America. 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013 (pp. 551–558), p. 553.