Snack attack

I made some super tasty veggie burgers yesterday (recipe to come...I gotta tweak it a little) and I needed a side.  Fries are the obvious choice.  But darn it all if I didn't have a single potato in my house.  Not one!  There's a never ending list of fries made with every vegetable imaginable.  Green beans, eggplant, carrots, asparagus...seriously it goes on forever.  And when I found this recipe on A Cozy Kitchen, I almost started chewing on my laptop.  Which I think goes against everything the manual would tell you to do.  Don't chew on your puter.

So I will rarely do this, but I'm just going to share this recipe exactly as it is.  I try to come up with my own stuff or put my own spin on recipes, but this is so perfect that it would just be silly to change a thing.  Polenta Fries.  Insane.  Have you had polenta?  My mom used to make it all the time.  It's so incredibly simple.  It's just milk and cornmeal, heated and stirred in a pot until it's thick.  Mom used to use it in chili pie recipes.  You can cool the mixture though and it makes a little cake.  This is what you'll do for the polenta fries, along with baking them until golden and crispy. 

Get ready to chew on your computer.

Baked Polenta Fries

- 4 cups whole milk
- 1 cup water
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 2 1/4 cup cornmeal
-1/2 cup grated Parmesan
- 2 teaspoons kosher salt, and more for sprinkling
- 2 tablespoons olive oil

Spray non-stick cooking spray on a baking sheet (or casserole dish). Bring milk, 1 cup water and butter to boil in heavy large saucepan. Gradually whisk in cornmeal. Reduce heat to low and cook until polenta is very thick and starts to pull away from sides of pan, stirring often, about 8 minutes. Remove from heat.

Stir in cheese and salt. Add more salt if you like. Immediately transfer polenta to prepared baking sheet, spreading mixture to a 1-inch thickness. Mine filled up half of the baking sheet. No biggie. Wrap with plastic wrap and refrigerate until cool and firm, about 1 hour. (You can totally do this a day ahead. Just be sure to cover and keep refrigerated.)

Cut polenta lengthwise in pan into three-inch-wide rectangles. Cut each rectangle crosswise into 3/4-inch-wide strips. Set polenta strips aside.

Preheat oven to 450F. Transfer polenta fries to lined baking sheet. Sprinkle with about a teaspoon of kosher salt and some olive oil. Bake for 20 minutes, flipping the fries at the 10 minute mark. Fries, when done, will be slightly golden brown at the edges

Recipe via A Cozy Kitchen


Visit A Cozy Kitchen for a recipe for Chili Lime Mayo to dip these suckers in.  Or just do what I did and hit that classic ketchup.  Yeah, man.