Mushrooms are one of those things that I don't buy regularly. But I'm constantly reading recipes that sound delicious and I think, I should write this on my shopping list and plan to make this! But then I don't. On the other hand, when I do buy mushrooms, but don't have a specific plan for them, they tend to wind up in the compost a couple of weeks later. I took that risk earlier this week, though: I bought a package of baby bella 'shrooms without a plan.
Thursday is the night Jon has class, and so I usually throw together whatever for dinner for the kids and me . . . but this week I sort of forgot that he wasn't coming home for dinner that night, and had the brainwave to make creamy polenta with sauteed mushrooms on top. When I remembered that I'd be eating it solo (no way would my kids touch this), I thought, oh, so what. It's what I want to eat, so I'm going to make it anyway.
And then I sliced polenta and fried it up with eggs for breakfast for the next few days. Yum!
Polenta
2 cups coarse cornmeal (I use Bob's Red Mill)
6 cups water (broth is excellent: think chickpea, or cannellini . . . darker bean broth will make it a little dingy-looking [though still delicious])
1 tsp salt
1 cup shredded sharp cheddar (optional, but yummy)
Mix all in a 9 by 13 pan. Put in a pre-heated 350 degree oven for 40 minutes. Stir, then bake another 15 minutes. It's a miracle -- delicious, creamy, slow-simmered polenta with No Stirring.
Mushrooms were just sort of thrown together -- onions, garlic, thyme, salt and pepper.
2 comments:
I like the idea of baking the polenta (and not stirring it)! Do you mix the water and cornmeal particularly carefully to avoid lumps?
Hi, bluej! This method is awesome: totally foolproof. I do not mix particularly carefully -- but I do use coarse cornmeal. I have never tried it with finer meal and it might be different with that!
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