Tag Archives: Corn

Polenta

Posted on March 23, 2011 | Leave a comment

I think I may have given the pink slip to some of my naughtier starchy side dishes. This is your basic polenta that you can either keep plain or build on. I love using this as a side dish now. You can do so much with it, it is delicious, and filling! I never knew how easy and fast polenta was to make. You can even make it ahead of time. Which I did, because I wanted to make sure I had nice firm cakes for grilling or pan frying. I even had one of these as a snack with a bit of mint sauce on top. YUM! I love these little cakes and can’t wait to bring them out for grilling season.

  • 1 cup cornmeal
  • 1.5 cup broth (any will do, I used chicken)
  • 1.5 cup water
  • 1/2 tsp sea salt
  • 1/2 tsp ground pepper
  • 1 tsp italian spice blend
  1. Combine the broth, water, and seasonings in a small pot.
  2. Bring to a boil.
  3. Reduce the heat to low and add the cornmeal. Stir constantly. The polenta will form up quite quickly. It is done when it is thick enough to pull away from the bottom of the pot.
  4. Pour into 6 jumbo muffin cups or 12 regular sized ones and smooth.
  5. Allow to cool. Refrigerate atleast 30 minutes or overnight. Reheat before serving by either pan frying until slightly golden or grilling.

Makes 6 servings. Each serving contains 77 calories, .9 gram of fat, 1.5 grams of fibre, 16 grams of carbs, and 1.9 grams of protein. My favourite part of these has to be when you panfry them just right, they get this crunchy crust and the inside is nice and creamy. Yum! A superb side dish.

Leave a comment

Posted in Sidedish, Snack

Tagged

Spicy Spread

Posted on October 15, 2010 | Leave a comment

No, I’m not being dirty…this time. This is a spicy margarine spread that I made for an awesome side dish the other day. It was a nice step away from the usual and perfect for compliment a delicious fall time veggie: corn! Oh glorious corn! This is the last month for farmer’s market around here so I’ve been taking advantage of all that fresh local corn. I used this on a lovely sweet yellow corn, num! I think its extra great that the spread turns into such a fall festive colour too. Check it out!

  • 2-3 tbl light cooking margarine
  • 1 red hot chili pepper (not the band…that would just get gruesome)
  • 1 tsp fresh basil, chopped
  • ground pepper to taste
  1. Remove the seeds and top of the pepper. Chop very fine.
  2. Combine all ingredients in a bowl or ramekin until it looks like above. Allow to sit at room temp for 10 minutes before using.

This makes about 4 tbl of spicy spread. Each tbl contains 22 calories, 1 gram fat and .2 gram of fibre. To use this spread I covered a cob of sweet yellow corn and grilled the corn for 20-30 minutes on low or medium heat. I specifically wanted that slight char and smoky taste. I basted one side, cooked, flipped halfway through cooking and basted the other side. The end result on the cob:

Mmmmm. For more civilized eating the corn can be cut off the cob carefully to give you something more like this:

Either way it remains tasty! A great side dish during this harvest season. The best part is, everything except the margarine was obtained from my local farmers market. Hurray!

Leave a comment

Posted in Ingredient, Sidedish

Tagged , , ,