[Sca-cooks] Apicius' polenta recipe

[Terry Decker]

>> sprinkle with pepper and serve.  You will do even better if you use
>> milk
>>
>> instead of flour.
>
> Ya mean "milk instead of water", by any chance?
>
> The first thing that comes to mind here to me, more than fried mush,  is 
> gnocchi a la romana...
>
> I had originally asked about the connection between fried mush and 
> polenta and Apicius because while this thread was starting, I was 
> involved in a private discussion wherein some equivocation was made 
> between polenta and corn/maize-meal-mush. Which is not the be-all and 
> end-all of polenta, but it's the first thing most moderns think of.
>
> Adamantius

Yeah.  Milk instead of water.  And I still got them fat fingers I had back 
then.

Gnocchi is a dough that is formed, then cooked.  Polenta is batter which is 
boiled to density, then formed.  Apicius calls for a firm polenta which is 
then cut to shape and fried.  I can see why you might think of gnocchi, but 
my mind sees my Mom cutting slices off the loaf of mush that she shaped in a 
bread tin.

I tend to think of polenta and mush as equivalents as both are boiled grain 
meal of varying consistency.  If mush is an alteration of mash as is 
suggested by the dictionary, then both terms pre-date maize in Europe, they 
have a general meaning, they are essentially equivalent, and their 
relationship to cornmeal is one of modern usage with any equivocation being 
a lack of serious consideration about the origins of the words and dishes. 
Damn, that's pompous sounding.  Fun.

The chief difference I see is one word is derived from Latin and the other 
is an Anglo-Saxon derivative.

Bear