“It definitely cuts through sweetness really well.”King's corn pastry cream appeared in Erika Kwee’s sweet corn layer cake a couple weeks after its debut. She uses a specific type of heirloom Mexican corn called chalqueña cremoso which gives the jelly a delicately milky flavor. She’s dreaming up chocolate tortillas, corn cookies and conchas—it’s all about harnessing the unique flavors and aromas in heirloom corn. Once you start paying attention to the distinct flavors in heirloom corn, “you'll see the difference in the flavor notes,” Juárez says. But in the right hands, heirloom corn can become nearly anything.