Sometimes the story about a dish is just as interesting as the dish. Such is the case with my mom’s corn salad recipe.
Several years ago a friend of my mom and dad’s died, so they had a memorial service for the friend at the American Legion. My mom didn’t go to the service because she was working at the time. My dad did go to the service only he had to bring a dish of food. My mom couldn’t think of anything to make, and she didn’t have a lot of time. She had corn, but didn’t want to send plain corn to the service. So she put our Italian-American spin on it and off it went.
Not typical funeral food; that’s for sure. The dish was well received and eaten entirely. We make it now as a summer salad, and we love it.

Corn Salad Recipe
Ingredients
- 4 cups fresh or frozen corn cooked
- 2 cups water
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ cup onion chopped
- ½ cup green pepper diced
- ½ cup celery diced
- 1 small tomato diced
- 1 tablespoon fresh basil chopped
- 8 black olives sliced
- 2 tablespoon red wine vinegar
- 4 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
- Salt & pepper to taste
Instructions
- Put corn, water, and salt into pot and cook 7-9 minutes over medium high heat. Remove from heat, drain and cool.
- Chop the onion, dice the pepper, celery and tomato. Set aside.
- Place the cooled corn into a medium sized bowl. Add the onion, pepper, celery, olives, and tomato. Add 1½ tablespoons red wine vinegar and 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil. Mix well. Add fresh basil and toss. Salt and pepper to taste.
- Set aside for about 15 minutes before serving so flavors will blend together.
[…] veggies in an oil and vinegar dressing. Broccoli, Italian green beans, brussels sprouts, beets, corn, white radishes, and baby potatoes are just some of the dishes that we drench in oil and vinegar […]