savory polenta cake
(vegetarian)

recipe by m-c

just the recipe

what I was looking for

A way to thank Mark, my husband, for his patience as I completely reorganize all our books, the kitchen, the guest room/pantry combo, and the basement. This re-org has been going on for months, and the closest he's come to complaining is to ask, ever so gently and ever so infrequently, whether it might be a good day to tidy things up. A little. If I have the time.

what I made

A variation on Alice Waters's polenta cake (polenta torta), a layered savory dish of long‑cooked cornmeal with lots of cheese and a flavorful filling, from The Art of Simple Cooking, page 95, using my own method for cooking polenta and my own filling.

chit-chat

Mark loves all things corn: cornmeal pancakes (his favorite thing to cook), cornbread (second favorite), cornmeal mush, hominy, grits, a bizarre snack called corn nuts, corn on the cob, fried corn and potatoes, corn frittata, mixed corn and wild rice, parched corn, Indian pudding, succotash.

His favorite thing for me to cook is polenta, and I roll it out when I want to thank him for something or apologize or treat him sweetly.

In the last few years our polenta consumption has become bimodal: lots of polenta in the summer, not so much in the fall, winter, and spring. Fifteen or twenty years ago I tried a dish called "polenta in chains," polenta with something (the "chains") stirred into it, like sliced napa cabbage or fried peppers or pitted black olives. The recipe -- was it a recipe? Was it something my Italian teachers told me about? Was it a passing mention in a travel article? At any rate, the idea was to stir whole corn kernels into the polenta and cook them together.

Now, I have to say that I like frozen corn. I like the sweetness, I like the rubbery texture, I like the convenience. I no more compare frozen corn with fresh than I compare kosher dills with fresh cucumbers or canned tomatoes with fresh heirlooms. Both are good, they're just different.

So without thinking too much about it, I tossed some frozen-corn "chains" into the polenta, cooked them together, and served them up. We all agreed, Mark and Margaret and I, that the dish was OK but nothing special.

Then four or five years ago, during my annual corn orgy, the light went on inside my head. Oh, that's what's supposed to be the chains, fresh corn.

Unfortunately, falling in love with polenta in chains of fresh corn seems to have made me forget about polenta in all the other kinds of chains, the chopped chard or caper or roasted garlic chains, let alone plain ordinary polenta. This must stop. Out of corn season I should still make some kind of polenta once or twice a month to keep the wheels of my marriage running smoothly.

grades for my version

healthy	C	All that cheese ... sigh.
fast	C	Not fast.
easy	A	Very easy.
cheap	B	The cheese has to be good, so not very cheap.
delicious	A	Oh! Oh, oh. Oh.

yield

Serves three
(or two for supper plus two small breakfast portions).

equipment

   a nonstick cooking pot with a lid
   a soft(probably silicone) pancake turner
   a dishtowel
   an immersion blender
   a toaster oven
   a small baking dish
   a flexible metal or rubber or silicone spreader

the polenta

ingredients	Alice scaled	m-c	why?
polenta (coarse cornmeal)	⅔ cup	⅔ cup	no change
water	2 ⅔ cup plus more as needed	2 ⅔ cup plus more as needed	no change
salt	to taste	to taste	no change

When I first made polenta, some time in the late 60s, I dutifully followed the instructions to boil the water and then dribble the dry polenta into the boiling water, stirring clockwise all the while. Or was it counter-clockwise? But certainly in only one direction.

Then one day I said to myself, this is ridiculous. Why am I doing this hard thing rather than trying an easy thing? I mixed the cold water into the dry polenta, at first a small amount, stir, then more, stir, then all the rest. I put the pot on the stove, heated it up to a simmer, and never looked back. I've tried at least a dozen different ways of making polenta since then (I'm just about to tell you my current favorite), but I've never again stirred dry polenta into swirling boiling water, and I'd advise you not to either.

Alice tells you to do the traditional thing, and you should certainly do that if it will make you feel authentic and happy. Otherwise:

      Put the dry polenta into your nonstick pan and mix in the initial amount of water and the salt. (Notice that I am learning to use nonstick pans.)

Put the pot on a low flame and let it come up to the temperature that raises small bubbles in the polenta. Stir the mass thoroughly with your soft pancake turner, put the top on and ...

   Set your timer for ten minutes. (Notice that I am learning to use a timer.)

Come back when the timer rings, stir the polenta, adding any water needed to make it stir easily, set the timer for ten minutes again, repeat.

The difference between cornmeal mush and polenta is that polenta cooks much longer than mush, giving all the granules time to swell to their maximum and the flavor the opportunity to mature and mellow. Mush is good; polenta is even better.

If you wanted mush, you could probably eat it after the first ten-minute stint, certainly after the second, and it would be good. But if you want polenta, stick with it, see whether you agree that polenta's worth the wait. I do mine a minimum of forty minutes -- four of those ten-minute intervals. After five or six you start getting diminishing returns.

the infusion

ingredients	Alice scaled	m-c	why?
butter	2 Tablespoons	2 Tablespoons	no change
Parmesan cheese	⅓ cup grated	⅓ cup grated	no change

Turn the heat off, take the lid off the pot, and stir in the butter and cheese.

   Cover the pot with a dishtowel and put the lid back on. (The towel absorbs any extra water and keeps the polenta from having little puddles of moisture on its surface.)

Let the polenta cure (rest and develop even more flavor) for 15-20 minutes.

One of my favorite cookbook authors, Paula Wolfert, has the perfect word for properly cooked and cured polenta: bosomy.

the filling

Alice uses a home-made tomato sauce for a filling.

I used instead a spread that I had on hand. I had made it according to a freehand recipe of mine. The measures below are approximations.

ingredients
sautéed white mushrooms	¼ cup
cooked black chickpeas	¼ cup
cooked wild rice	¼ cup
toasted almonds	¼ cup

   Blend the ingredients to a coarse puree with your immersion blender. (A food processor probably won't do a good job on such a small amount.)

building up the cake

ingredients	Alice scaled	m-c	why?
fresh mozzarella cheese	6 oz. of balls sliced	6 oz. of disks unsliced	faster? [1]
Parmesan cheese	⅔ cup grated	⅔ cup grated	no change
Notes
[1]	I had never seen mozzarella disks before and thought they might be more convenient than slicing the balls. Total time saved must have been 8-10 seconds max.

   Preheat your toaster oven to 350°.

   Grease your small baking pan however you like best.

With your fingers, break off pieces of the cooked and cooled polenta. Use about half the total amount to make a mosaic layer in the bottom of your baking pan.

(You may well ask, Why not pour the still-hot polenta into the baking pan so that you don't have to make a mosaic? It's fine to do it that way if you prefer, and that's how Alice does it. I think I get more flavor from the curing step after the infusing, but really, how much difference can it make?)

   Spread the mushroom-chickpea-wild-rice-almond spread evenly over the first layer of polenta.

Lay half the mozzarella disks (or slices) over the spread as evenly as you can.

Make a mosaic of the other half of the polenta and top it with the other half of the mozzarella and then the Parmesan cheese.

Bake it till the top is molten and browned, probably about 15 minutes, but the time will vary greatly depending on the size and shape of your baking dish, so check it at 10 minutes and then every 5 minutes thereafter.

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