Recipe - Fried Polenta With Simmered Beef Sauce

1 Recipe simmered beef sauce
1 Recipe fried polenta
Freshly grated parmesan
cheese

SIMMERED BEEF SAUCE
3 tablespoon Butter
1 Onion, finely chopped
1 Carrot, scraped and finely
chopped
1 Stalk celery, finely chopped
One half cup Parsley, minced
1/8 teaspoon Crushed dried rosemary
2 Cloves garlic, peeled and
finely chopped
One half pound Mushrooms, cleaned and
chopped
1 pound Lean beef (round or chuck),
minced (not ground)
One half cup Dry marsala wine, or red
wine
1 1/3 cup Strong beef stock, boiling
Salt and black pepper to
taste
Grated rind from One half lemon

In the bottom of a small Dutch oven, melt the butter and add the onion,
carrot, celery, parsley, rosemary, garlic, and mushrooms. Simmer several
minutes, stirring frequently until the vegetables are soft, but not brown.
Add the minced meat to the pan and stir until it has lost all pinkness. Add
the Marsala, boiling stock, salt, Pepper, and lemon rind and bring the
sauce to a good simmer. Cover tightly and place in a 275 degree F oven for
about 4 to 5 hours. The meat should be broken down and the sauce very
thick. Serve hot.

To serve Place slices of fried polenta on heated plates and ladle some of
the meat sauce over them. Sprinkle with grated cheese and pass extra cheese
at the table.

Basic Polenta

6 One half cups water 1 teaspoon salt 2 cups coarseground yellow corn
meal, or polenta 3 tablespoons butter, to 4

Bring the water and salt to a boil in a large, heavy kettle. Pour in the
corn meal very, very slowly, stirring constantly. You should be able to see
the individual grains of the meal or you're pouring too fast. A slow pour
prevents the mixure from being lumpy. Simmer gently, stirring almost
continually for around 30 minutes. The polenta is done when it pulls away
from the pan. (CAUTION: I wear long mits while stirring....the mixture
tends to bubble and SPLAT you with hot stuff. One thing I do, is only cook
and stir for maybe 10 minutes, then I turn way down, cover and let it steam
itself. Who wants to stand there stirring for 30 minutes??)

Fried Polenta

1 recipe Basic Polenta (above)

Pour the hot cooked polenta into a buttered loaf pan and cool. Turn out
onto a board and cut with a taughtly stretched string into One half inch (12 mm)
slices. Brush slices lightly with butter. Fry in Sizzling butter for
several minutes on each side, until crisp and lightly brown. Serve hot with
more butter and grated cheese.

Typos by Brenda Adams and prepped by MC_Buster; mc post 4/14/97

Recipe by: The Best of Ethnic Home Cooking, Mary Poulos Wilde Posted to
MCRecipe Digest V1 #568 by Brenda Adams adamsfmle@sprintmail.com on Apr
14, 1997