Tuesday, March 5, 2013

Basic Polenta

The best polenta recipe is Alton Brown's Savory Polenta.  It tastes amazing.  But the cheap, simple way is just to mix one part corn meal to three parts liquid, as I found on AllRecipes.  I'm making basic polenta today because the Alton variety contains Parmesan cheese and butter, which I don't want to feed to Simran, and I'm serving it under vegan chili anyway, so the flavor isn't as important as the healthiness today.  Warning: Corn meal and water and nothing else makes for very bland, borderline gross polenta.  Under chili it's okay, but alone it is just awful.  I'm dressing mine up a bit today with some broth and fresh ground black pepper.

Ingredients
1 cup corn meal
3 cups water or vegetable broth (I'm using half low-sodium organic veg broth and half water today)

Directions

1. Bring water to a boil. Reduce to a simmer. Pour in polenta steadily, stirring constantly. Continue to stir until polenta is thickened. It should come away from sides of the pan, and be able to support a spoon. This can take anywhere from 20 to 50 minutes. Pour polenta onto a wooden cutting board, let stand for a few minutes.  (I line a casserole dish with foil, pour in the polenta, and refrigerate it until I want to use it.  Then I cut it into cubes and broil it until singed on top and hot throughout.)

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