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Polenta, a l'Italienne

A baked polenta dish with butter, cheese, and cracker crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cheese are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,962 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Polenta, a l'Italienne

Oven, in the book's wordsA brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a brisk oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Brush the inside of a small saucepan with melted butter.

  2. In the saucepan, combine water and cornmeal to make mush, cooking it covered for about 2 hours on low heat.

  3. Stir in half the butter, salt, and pepper into the cooked mush until well combined.

Assemble and bake

  1. Spread the remaining butter on the bottom of a 2-quart baking pan and sprinkle half the cracker meal over it.

  2. Spoon the mush into the pan, smoothing it out without disturbing the bottom layer.

  3. Top the mush with minced cheese and sprinkle the remaining cracker meal on top.

  4. Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) for about 30 minutes, or until nicely browned.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Butter + cheesetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Cheese + peppertop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,861 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Yellow cornmeal
Forms the thick mush that makes up the body of the dish when cooked with water.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, and helps the bottom layer brown and crisp in the pan.
Cheese
Melts over the mush and adds savoury flavour and a rich, browned top.
Cracker meal
Forms a crisp, golden crust on the bottom and top layers as it browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Baking until nicely browned. Cornmeal mush is soft and pale when cooked, so the browning comes from the oven. Baking long enough lets the surface and cracker meal brown and set, giving a firmer texture for slicing and serving.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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