Discover how to prepare these three traditional dishes that enhance the goodness of polenta
Village that you go, polenta that you find. Yes, because of recipes for polenta there are plenty throughout the peninsula. Today we present you three – the Valtellina taragna, the Como-style tannage and the carbonara Marche region – for the series: tell me how to eat polenta and I'll tell you who you are.
Corn and buckwheat: an unbeatable pair
Originally, before the discovery of the Americas and therefore of the corn, polenta was a very common dish on all Italian soil, prepared with spelled flour, rye, barley or buckwheat. In Valtellina and in the Lecco area (but also diffused in the Bergamo area, in Val Camonica, in the Brescia area and in the Canavese area) this tradition has been maintained, preparing the taragna: a polenta prepared with cornmeal and buckwheat, cereal that in reality is not a grain (and therefore does not contain gluten, as well as corn). The taragna has a dark color and is enriched when cooked with cheese.
Polenta tanning
Also known as vüncia or uncia, it is a rich and seasoned dish, that is to say acconciato, hence the name. Unlike the taragna, cheese is added to the polenta concia – and other ingredients, different from region to region – at the end of cooking. In Como it mixes with a sautéed with butter, garlic, sage and half-fat cheese. In Val d'Aosta and in the Biella area – areas where this is one of the most popular polenta recipes – is simply enriched with fmelted away, in addition to butter and / or milk, obtaining a dish with a fairly liquid consistency. The difference in these two areas of Italy makes it butter: in Val d'Aosta it is added to the polenta with cheese at the end of cooking; in the Biella area, further melted butter is added to the plate of each diner. Also to Piacenza and surroundings it is used to eat polenta tanning, which here however is made from thin layers of polenta alternated with sauce and Grana Padano.
Recipes for polenta, not only from the north
Even the Marche, a region that does not usually define itself as "polentona", has its own workhorse for recipes for polenta: the carbonara. It was the typical dish of woodcutter and charcoal burners from the mountain area of Catria and Nerone and is prepared by seasoning cornmeal porridge with pork, bacon and grated cheese.
There is also one Trentino version, which always associates pork (in this case a fresh salami sausage and onion) with corn polenta.
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