Wake up to flavor of the Southwest

Blue Corn Pancakes

In Arizona and New Mexico, corn is grown in many colors, including red, white, and blue. The blue variety, finely ground into meal, is a ubiquitous ingredient in Southwest native foods. Blue cornmeal is put to work in tortillas and chips, plus a host of other intriguing, lesser-known dishes, such as Hopi paper bread.

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With its pleasant parched flavor and slightly crunchy texture, blue cornmeal has also gained popularity in recent years in everyday non-native foods like pancakes and waffles. Near Santa Fe, where I often visit for the cultural contrasts of opera and rodeo, I came across these thick, platter-size blue cornmeal pancakes, as light and tender as any I’ve eaten. You can find blue cornmeal in natural-food stores and most well-stocked supermarkets throughout the West.

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