Italian Valdostan Cheesy Polenta with Fontina | Polenta Concia Valdostana

Sep 22

11 min read

Polenta Concia Valdostana (Italian Valdostan Cheesy Polenta with Fontina)

Polenta concia is what Valle d'Aosta does when cornmeal alone is not enough to get a family through a winter at altitude. The verb conciare means to dress or to treat, and here it means folding butter and a great deal of Fontina into finished polenta until the grain stops being a porridge and becomes something closer to a loose, molten dough that pulls in threads behind the spoon.

It is a two ingredient dish in the sense that matters. Everything depends on the cornmeal, which must be coarse and stone ground, and on the cheese, which must be genuine Fontina DOP. Neither is improved by anything else in the pot, and both are ruined by rushing.

The method below cooks the polenta a full 45 minutes over low heat, then takes the pot off the flame before the cheese goes in. That detail is the whole technique. Fontina melted over direct heat splits into rubber and oil; melted in residual heat it stays a smooth elastic suspension inside the corn.

Yield: 4 servings. Prep: 15 minutes. Cook: 50 minutes. Rest: 5 minutes. Total: about 1 hour 10 minutes. Difficulty: intermediate. Course: primo piatto. Region: Valle d'Aosta, the alpine valleys above Aosta.

The Story

Maize reached the alpine valleys late, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and when it arrived it displaced the rye, barley and chestnut porridges that had fed the mountains for centuries. Valle d'Aosta is too high and too cold to grow much of it, so the grain came up from the Piedmontese plain and was treated as a precious commodity. What the valley had in abundance was milk, butter and cheese, and polenta concia is the result of that imbalance: a little bought grain stretched with a great deal of local dairy.

Fontina is the reason the dish exists in this form. It has been made here since at least the fifteenth century from the raw whole milk of Valdostana cows, worked within hours of milking and matured for roughly three months in cool stone cellars and rock cut caves. That maturation gives a cheese with high moisture and a low melting point, so it goes fluid rather than stringy and disperses through hot polenta instead of clumping in it.

In the old houses the polenta was cooked in a copper paiolo over the open fire, stirred with a long wooden stick and eaten straight from the board with carbonade, sausages or nothing at all. Every valley has its variation. Around Gressoney the cheese may be toma rather than Fontina, some households add a spoonful of buckwheat flour, and in Cogne rice replaces part of the grain. The principle never changes: grain, butter, mountain cheese, patience.

Ingredients

For the polenta

Coarse stone ground yellow cornmeal, 1 1/2 cups (250 g)
Water, 5 cups (1.2 litres)
Coarse sea salt, 2 tsp (12 g)
Whole milk, 1/2 cup (120 ml), optional, for a softer finish

For the conciatura

Fontina DOP, rind removed, cut into 1/2 inch (1 cm) cubes, 9 oz (250 g)
Unsalted alpine butter, cold and diced, 5 tbsp (70 g)
Freshly ground black pepper, 1/2 tsp, plus more to taste

For finishing

Unsalted butter, 2 tbsp (30 g), for browning
Fresh sage leaves, 6, optional
Grana Padano, finely grated, 2 tbsp (12 g), optional
Coarse sea salt, a few grains per plate

Preparation

Step 1

Prepare the cheese first. Take the Fontina out of the refrigerator 1 hour before you start, strip off the rind and cut the cheese into cubes of about 1/2 inch (1 cm). Cold cheese dropped into hot polenta chills the pot and melts unevenly, leaving rubbery cores. Dice the 5 tablespoons of butter and keep it cold and separate. Everything for the conciatura must be within reach before the grain goes into the water.

Step 2

Salt the water properly. Bring the 5 cups (1.2 litres) of water to a rolling boil in a heavy bottomed pot, ideally copper or thick steel, and add the 2 teaspoons of coarse salt. Salt it now rather than later: cornmeal absorbs seasoning as it cooks, while salt stirred into finished polenta sits on the surface and tastes harsh. The ratio is roughly 5 parts water to 1 part meal, deliberately generous because a great deal of cheese and butter follows.

Step 3

Rain in the cornmeal. Lower the heat to a steady simmer, then let the meal fall through the fingers of one hand in a thin continuous stream while you whisk constantly with the other. Never tip it in as a mass. The grain must disperse before it hydrates, and a lump formed in the first thirty seconds will still be there in an hour. Keep whisking 2 minutes after the last of it goes in.

Step 4

Cook it low and long. Swap the whisk for a wooden spoon and set the heat as low as the burner allows, so the polenta blips rather than boils. Cook 45 minutes, stirring thoroughly every 4 or 5 minutes and always scraping the bottom and corners. It will spit, so use a long spoon and a partly covering lid. Coarse stone ground meal needs the full time: polenta pulled at 20 minutes tastes chalky no matter how much cheese goes in.

Step 5

Judge the cooking point. It is ready when it comes cleanly away from the sides of the pot as you stir, when a spoonful holds its shape for a moment before settling, and above all when a taste leaves no grittiness between the teeth. That last test is the only one that counts. If it is thicker than you want, beat in the optional 1/2 cup (120 ml) of warm milk, since the conciatura will tighten it further.

Step 6

Fold in the butter and Fontina. Take the pot off the heat entirely and let it stand 1 minute. Beat in the cold diced butter until it disappears, then add the Fontina in three additions, stirring vigorously and waiting for each batch to melt before the next goes in. Work fast and keep the spoon moving. The residual warmth, around 190°F (88°C), is more than enough to melt the cheese and well below the point at which its fat breaks out.

Step 7

Season and rest. Grind in the black pepper and taste. It will very likely need no further salt, because the Fontina and the cooking water have already seasoned it, and this is the commonest place to overdo it. Cover the pot and rest it 5 minutes, until the cheese has finished dispersing and the mass falls slowly from a raised spoon in a thick ribbon.

Step 8

Brown the finishing butter. While the polenta rests, melt the 2 tablespoons of butter in a small pan over medium heat until the milk solids turn golden and it smells of hazelnut, about 2 minutes, adding the sage for the last 30 seconds. Pour it straight into a cold bowl, because butter at this stage goes from nutty to burnt in seconds.

Plating

Heat the plates to around 160°F (70°C), hotter than for almost anything else. Polenta concia is held together by melted cheese and begins to set the instant it meets a cool surface. A cold plate gives a skin within a minute and a solid disc within five.

Serve it in wide shallow bowls, one large spoonful per person, dropped from a few inches so it spreads under its own weight into a soft irregular pool. Do not smooth it with the back of a spoon. This is mountain food and the surface should look like it fell there.

Make a shallow well in the centre and pour the browned butter into it, with the crisped sage, so the fat gathers instead of running to the edge. A small scattering of grated Grana Padano, a few grains of coarse salt and a final grind of pepper finish it. Carry it to the table at once, and if carbonade or a valley sausage is going alongside, put it beside the polenta rather than on top.

Professional Technique

The controlling technique is melting the Fontina off the heat. Cheese fat is held in emulsion by casein proteins, and above roughly 175°F (80°C) those proteins tighten and squeeze the fat out, which is what turns a cheesy polenta into an oily one with rubbery threads through it. Finished polenta sits at about 190°F (88°C) and cools quickly once the pot leaves the burner, so the one minute pause puts the mass exactly in the band where Fontina flows without breaking. Return it to the flame afterwards and it splits within a minute.

The second is the order of the conciatura. Butter goes in before cheese, never after. Cold butter beaten into hot polenta emulsifies into the starch and leaves a film of fat around the grain, and that film is what stops the cheese bonding to itself in clumps when it arrives. Reverse the order and the Fontina hits bare starch, grabs hold and forms strings no amount of stirring will disperse.

The third is the continuous rain of meal into simmering water. Cornmeal hydrates faster than it disperses, so any part that lands as a clump seals on the outside and stays raw within. Letting it fall in a thin stream through the fingers separates the particles in the air before the water reaches them. It is the difference between smooth polenta and polenta you have to sieve.

Texture and Moisture Control

Water ratio is the first lever. At 5 parts water to 1 part coarse meal the polenta finishes soft, which is right here because 9 oz (250 g) of cheese and 5 tablespoons of butter thicken it substantially at the end. Build it at the stiff 4 to 1 ratio used for polenta that will be sliced and the conciatura turns it into mortar. If the pot tightens too far during the cook, loosen it with boiling water a ladle at a time, never cold, which shocks the starch.

Cooking time governs everything the tongue feels. Starch granules in coarse meal need the full 45 minutes to absorb water, swell and burst, and that bursting releases the amylose which makes cooked polenta creamy. Pull the pot early and the grain is still intact: gritty, and no quantity of Fontina will hide it. Test by rubbing a little between the fingers.

The finished mass should fall from a raised spoon in a thick continuous ribbon that folds back on itself, not in a drop and not as a lump. Too stiff, beat in warm milk a spoonful at a time. Too loose, return it briefly to the lowest heat before the cheese goes in, never after. Serve within five minutes, because it thickens steadily from the moment it stops being stirred.

Professional Mise en Place

Almost nothing here can be done far ahead, and the one thing that must be is bringing the cheese to room temperature. Organise around the 45 minute cook.

Equipment and tools

Heavy copper or thick bottomed steel pot, 4 quart (4 litre)
Balloon whisk for the first minutes and a long wooden spoon for the rest
Small pan for the browned butter and a cold bowl to stop it
Instant read thermometer, useful for confirming the cheese goes in below 190°F (88°C)
Wide shallow bowls and a warming drawer or low oven for heating them

Prepared ahead

Fontina derinded and cubed, 1 hour ahead, held at room temperature
Butter diced and kept cold, ready beside the pot
Water measured and salt weighed before the grain is opened
Sage picked and dried, Grana grated, on the day
Kettle of boiling water standing by for loosening the pot

Service setup

Bowls heated to around 160°F (70°C)
Polenta resting covered, off the heat, for no more than 5 minutes
Browned butter warm but not on the flame
Pepper mill and coarse salt at the pass
Accompaniments plated first, so the polenta is the last thing to move

Chef Tips

Buy Fontina DOP with the consortium mark on the rind and nothing else. Fontal, Fontina made outside the valley and the industrial imitations carry less moisture and melt into strings rather than flowing. The cheese is half this dish and the wrong one cannot be compensated for.

Use coarse stone ground cornmeal, not instant and not fine. Instant polenta is precooked and dried and gives you something edible in 5 minutes that tastes of very little. The coarse grain supplies the faint sweetness and the body that keep this from being simply melted cheese.

Keep a kettle of boiling water on the side throughout. Polenta thickens unpredictably depending on the grind and the pot, and being able to loosen it instantly with boiling water is what lets you cook it by feel rather than by measurement.

Save the leftovers deliberately. Spread the surplus in a shallow oiled tray, chill it until firm, then cut it into fingers and fry or grill them. In the valley this second life is as traditional as the first.

Common Mistakes

Adding the Fontina over the flame. Above about 175°F (80°C) the cheese proteins tighten and force the fat out, leaving an oily pool and rubbery strings. Take the pot off the heat, wait a minute, then fold the cheese in.

Tipping the cornmeal in all at once. The grain hydrates faster than it separates, so a poured mass forms lumps that seal outside and stay raw within. Let it fall in a thin stream through your fingers while whisking.

Cutting the cooking short. Coarse meal needs the full 45 minutes for the starch to swell and burst. Less is gritty on the tongue and the cheese will not disguise it.

Using Fontal or a generic alpine cheese. They carry less moisture and melt into threads instead of flowing through the grain. Insist on Fontina DOP.

Salting at the end. Salt added to finished polenta sits on the surface and tastes sharp, and with this much Fontina it is easy to go too far. Season the water, then taste.

Letting it sit before serving. It sets as it cools and turns from molten to sliceable within ten minutes. Rest it five, then serve on hot plates and not a moment later.

Wine Pairing

Valle d'Aosta Donnas DOC: The valley's own Nebbiolo, grown on terraces at the mouth of the region, and the classic bottle for this plate. Its firm acidity and fine dry tannin cut straight through the butter and melted Fontina, while the rose and tar aromatics lift a dish that has no aromatics of its own. Lighter than a Piedmontese Nebbiolo, which keeps it from flattening the corn.

Valle d'Aosta Petite Arvine: The white answer, and for many the better one. Petite Arvine brings high mountain acidity, grapefruit and a distinctly saline finish that scrubs the fat off the palate between spoonfuls. Because the dish has no acidity at all of its own, a dry white with this much tension does more useful work than most reds. Serve it at 50°F (10°C).

Valle d'Aosta Fumin: The valley's most structured red, dark and peppery with notable tannin and a smoky character. It stands up to the density of cheese and butter without being absorbed by it, and works best when the polenta comes alongside carbonade or a smoked valley sausage. Give it a couple of years and decant it.

Valle d'Aosta Cornalin: An old alpine variety recovered from near extinction, medium bodied with bright sour cherry fruit, low tannin and a wild herbal edge. Its lightness is the point: where Fumin matches the dish in weight, Cornalin cuts against it and refreshes. The best choice when the polenta is eaten on its own rather than under a stew, and good served slightly cool.

Valtellina Superiore DOCG: From the alpine terraces of Lombardy, another mountain Nebbiolo with the same job and a little more flesh. Its dried cherry fruit, tea leaf tannin and firm acidity handle the fat well, and the austerity it takes from the granite echoes the plainness of the corn. The natural choice when Donnas cannot be found.

Storage & Reheating

Polenta concia does not keep in its molten state, so store it as a solid. Spread leftovers into a shallow oiled tray about 3/4 inch (2 cm) deep, cover the surface directly with film to stop a skin forming, and refrigerate up to 3 days. It sets firm and cuts cleanly. It also freezes in slices, separated by paper, for up to 2 months.

To bring it back as polenta, break the cold mass into a saucepan with 1/4 cup (60 ml) of milk or water per portion and warm it over the lowest heat, beating steadily until it loosens. Keep it well below a simmer, because the Fontina will split a second time if it gets too hot. A little fresh butter at the end restores the gloss.

The better option is the traditional one. Cut the set polenta into fingers or thick slices and fry them in butter or grill them until blistered outside and molten within. Frozen slices go straight into the pan. Never use a microwave: it heats unevenly, the cheese separates and the texture is beyond repair.

Nutrition

Per serving, based on 4 servings:

Calories: 690 kcal
Total Fat: 42 g
Saturated Fat: 25 g
Trans Fat: 0.8 g
Unsaturated Fat: 14 g
Cholesterol: 120 mg
Sodium: 1150 mg
Total Carbohydrates: 52 g
Fiber: 4 g
Total Sugars: 3 g
Added Sugars: 0 g
Protein: 25 g
Lactose: 1.2 g
Principal micronutrients: calcium, phosphorus, vitamin A, vitamin B12, riboflavin, zinc, selenium