This Creamy Polenta Makes a Simple Dinner Feel Extra Comforting

What is Polenta?

Polenta is a yellow shaded Italian cornmeal porridge. Before the discovery of the New World and corn, people in northern Italy would use buckwheat or, in some places, even regular wheat, which they would also call polenta.

Nowadays, however, polenta is mostly associated with finely ground cornmeal. Polenta is like grits, but there are some differences.

Polenta is Italian and made of yellow corn, and it's at times coarser. Grits are a southern (US) specialty, and they're finer, made of white corn.

Ingredient Notes

My creamy polenta recipe consists of a few common, budget-friendly ingredients. The Polenta I use is usually an Italian product and imported. You can find those imported polenta packets in your nearest supermarket.

The finely ground polenta variety is the one I use. Typically, you can't go wrong with that kind of polenta. Polenta also keeps good over a longer period of time if you store it in an airtight container.

As a liquid, I prefer to use milk than water or broth because I believe milk turns the polenta extra creamy and soft. At the same time, I always add some butter to my polenta for a super velvety consistency.

The seasoning simply includes black pepper and salt, and typically you are better off with less salt because polenta is normally consumed as a side dish with other meals.

Recipe Tip: Polenta prepared with Water.

Process Overview

Step 1

Add milk and polenta to a pot and mix in. Keep it over a medium heat setting.

Step 2

Season with salt and black pepper and add butter.

Step 3

Keep on stirring over a medium-to-low-heat setting until the polenta thickens.

This takes a few minutes only. When done, take from the heat and serve up.

Flavor variations

You can add the following ingredient to this creamy polenta to pep it up:

• Parmesan or Gruyere Cheese
• Herb de Provence seasoning
• Cut prosciutto or salami

*See servings suggestions below the recipe card

Tips

To prepare quick and creamy polenta, you need to control the heat and follow the correct ratio between milk and polenta cornmeal. Polenta cooks up quickly and can burn easily as well if you don't take care.

The whole process takes about 5-7 minutes only. In North Italy, polenta is cooked over a longer period of time over low heat in a copper pot, while the cornmeal is being stirred continuously.

This is a traditional way of preparing polenta in Italy. I, personally, prefer to simply cook a quick and creamy polenta side dish.

The cornmeal gets even softer the longer you cook it (with more liquids), but I don't really want to spend the extra time standing over a hot flame, stirring along, just so that I get my polenta a bit softer. That said, I tend to be satisfied with a 5-7 minute long cooked, creamy polenta.

Serving

I adore tomato-based dishes with polenta, such as Mediterranean stuffed tomatoes with ground beef (French Tomate Farcie), Tomato Feta Shakshuka, Shrimp Fra Diavolo or simply stewed tomatoes and fried or poached eggs.

Otherwise, gravy-based chicken, fish, or beef dishes go really well with polenta. I like to serve my mom's salmon en papillote with this creamy polenta side dish, and occasionally I will prepare some sautéed portobello mushrooms as well with that.

Butter lemon garlic sautéed shrimp (prawns) and butter garlic fried squid rings (calamari) are great anytime with polenta.