[Sca-cooks] polenta

[Terry Decker]

Castore Durante in his Italian herbal 1585 mentions three culinary uses
among other things: Pane, polenta, torta

   "Fa la farina bianca, della quale si fa bel pane, la sostanza del
    quale è più grossa, & pi` viscosa del nostro. ... Fanno di questa
    farina i contadini le polente, & le torte aggiuntoui butiro,
    & formaggio, & è cibo non insuaue: ma genera grosso nudrimento".
    C. Durante p. 217f.)

There are references to the use of maize in Europe as early as 1539, but
Durante's is the first to specifically mention polenta.  Leonard Fuchs
states in his Herbal (1545) that maize was common, grown in many gardens and
used to make bread.

Bear


>
>--- Terry Decker <t.d.decker at worldnet.att.net>
>wrote:
>
>
>> Because of its natural sweetness, maize appears
>> to have become the polenta
>> grain of choice sometime during the 16th
>> Century.
>>
>> Bear
>
>I just looked up polenta in the Oxford Companion
>to Food and it says that maize became the grain
>of choice during the mid-17th Century, which I am
>inclined to believe, unless you have a period
>reference to maize and polenta that they don't
>know about?
>
>Huette
>
>
>
>=====
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