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Saracen and other Polenta

Italian polenta, from Latin pulmentum, is a firm and nutritious gruel that nowadays is predominantly made from corn. Very similar dishes with different names exist all over the world, from the Rumanian mamaliga to the East African ugali. But what was it made of before the arrival of corn from the Americas? Well, many things: barley, for once, was a common staple in Ancient Rome. Other possibilities were chestnuts, millet or, from the Middle Ages on and during the Renaissance, buckwheat. Buckwheat in Italian is called “grano saraceno“, Saracene grain, because it was introduced from Asia via the Middle East. And therefore this Northern Italian buckwheat polenta (in its local variations, here admittedly mixed with some corn flour) is called polenta saracena or polenta taragna. (A little fun fact: corn in Italian is called “granoturco“ - Turkish grain.) It is commonly mixed with butter and cheese and can be served with many toppings, like mushrooms in this case. Leftover polenta, no matter from which grain it’s made, is a wonderful thing: You can fry it, you can gratinate it, you can make it into a sandwich, or you can deep-fry it into polenta fries. You can find more recipes in my cookbooks "GARUM: Recipes from the Past“ (available in English, German, French and Italian) , "From Eden to Jerusalem: Recipes from the Time of the Bible“ (English, German and Italian), or "VEGETUS: Vegetarian Recipes from the Past“ (English, German, Italian).