My sister traveled the country recently, and brought me back some popcorn from the Corn Palace in South Dakota. They call it on-the-ear popcorn. (click images to supersize)

The ear is small. Much smaller than a regular ear of corn you'd buy at the grocery store. Whether that is because of drying or they just pick small ears, I don't know. I put the ear in the small paper sack that came with it, and taped it shut with scotch tape. Into the microwave it goes.

The popping was irregular, not like traditional microwave popcorn. After it got going, there was a flurry of popping about every 3 seconds or so, instead of the continuous popping you get with regular popcorn. The popping got further apart and slower, so I pulled it out, perhaps a little early. You can see how much corn is on the end of the ear down inside the bag.

After burning the hell out of my fingers, I pulled the ear out and emptied the bag (a few kernels at a time into my mouth). The popcorn was extra crunchy but not tough. It was plain, but tasted very good and had a unique flavor. It wasn't bland like you'd expect regular plain popcorn to be. I tried lightly salting it, but with no oil the salt just ended up in the bottom of the bag. After I was done eating, I put the ear back into the bag for some re-popping.

The re-popping went well. Much more of the popcorn popped off the ear, and it wasn't the least bit scorched. Another little treat of crunchy corn. You can see that if you get the timing right, most of the kernels pop.

It's truly a novelty. It doesn't make much, and I couldn't see buying popcorn like this regularly. But it was a neat gift and the corn was quite tasty.