I had no idea what to call these polenta shapes. Burgers? Nope. Patties? That’s just a burger, isn’t it? Frisbees? Pucks?
So I gave up and just went with good old, simple ‘polenta’ on it’s own, which, after all, is exactly what this is. And given the vagaries of trying to lure polenta into your desired shape, it might be best not to assign any shape-based nouns to this dish, as there’s a good chance you’ll end up making polenta splats, polenta balls or polenta mounds.
Polenta is peculiar stuff. It fills a void in my perception of food that exists somewhere between pasta and bread. It’s yet another thing which I hadn’t eaten much in the first 35 years of my life and only recently started to experiment with it. My main beef with it is the texture, so I wanted to try and get a little bit of crunch in there without having to go out and buy a deep fat fryer to cook it in. Luckily some time in the oven firms the outside up nicely and adds a super golden shine to the colour.
Sun-dried tomatoes are one of my favourite ingredients, hence they were first at the door when trying to suss out a good treatment for polenta. I obliged their willingness to help out and with great results, as just those tomatoes and a bit of rosemary are enough to give a breadth of flavour that lifts the polenta firmly into the ‘really tasty’ category and keeps it a pretty simple recipe. The feta topping makes a lovely bright and sharp counter the mouth filling polenta and rounds it all off beautifully.
Sun-dried tomato and rosemary polenta
By Gavin Wren
Serves 2
Uses 1 pot, a baking sheet and chef’s rings (optional)
PDF recipe card to download or print
Ingredients
75g quick cook polenta
335g vegetable stock
2 sprigs of rosemary – leaves only, finely chopped.
6 sun-dried tomatoes, roughly chopped
For the topping:
2 sun-dried tomaotes, finely chopped
40g feta
A few twists of freshly ground pepper
1 sprig of rosemary – leaves only, finely chopped.
Directions
Heat the polenta in a saucepan with the stock, bring to a simmer and lower the heat, then stir continually while it thickens. When it’s come together in one large, soft lump, turn off the heat.
Add the sundried tomatoes and rosemary and mix them in well. Line a baking sheet with baking paper and divide the mixture in two. Form the two halves into shapes on the baking sheet by hand or with spoons (tricky, because it’s very sticky) or use chef’s rings to make them into circles. Remove the chef’s rings before cooking.
Place in the oven and cook for 35 minutes.
Mix all of the topping ingredients together in a bowl. When the Polenta cakes are out of the oven, spoon the feta mixture over the top and serve. A simple salad would be a great accompaniment to this.