Polenta Cakes with Meat Sauce

Sugu...............simply means meat sauce in Italian.  Better yet, it is even simple to make!  For this recipe I wanted to try something unusual, daring, different.  I decided to make polenta cakes and top it with a sausage meat sauce!

If you have never tried polenta I encourage you to do so!  Polenta is cornmeal cooked into a porridge, or fried, in this case.  If you like grits you will love polenta!

Make your polenta according to package directions.  I add butter, cream and Parmesan cheese to mine.  For this recipe you can either make it into a porridge or refrigerate it so that you can fry it later.  A few days ago I made beef short ribs over polenta.  Instead of throwing away the leftover polenta,  I decided to wrap it up and use for this meal!

Before frying your polenta cakes you need to start the sugu.  Here are the ingredients I used:

1 pound Italian sausage
1 onion, diced
1 clove garlic, diced
1 can tomato sauce
1 can crushed tomatoes
Salt
Pepper
2 teaspoons parsley, basil and oregano
2 tablespoons Olive oil for saute

To begin the sauce, saute the onion and garlic in the olive oil.  Cook until translucent.

Add the sausage and brown.

Add the tomato sauce and crushed tomatoes.  I was able to open a jar of tomato sauce that I canned this summer!

Add the spices and let it simmer until it thickens.  I let mine simmer for an hour.

As that simmers, it is time to fry the polenta cakes.  Take the log of polenta and cut it up.  Heat up a skillet with a little olive oil and pry your cakes.  That's it!

Assemble your polenta cakes on a plate and top with the meat sauce.  I added fresh parsley and Parmesan on the top.

Here you go:  simple, impressive and cheap! 

Mangia!

Stuffed Chicken with Sundried Tomatoes

Mmmmmm!  I just finished an excellent dinner!  I stuffed a chicken breast with spinach, cheese and topped it with sun dried tomatoes.  Here is how I did it:

Take a chicken breast and put it in a Ziploc bag.  Take a meat pounder and pound the chicken breast thin.

Add olive oil, salt and pepper to the bag.  Take the chicken breast out, and lay some spinach and cheese on the breast.  Roll the breast up and place in some bread crumbs.  I used Panko bread crumbs.

Spinach from my garden and Provel cheese!

 



In a sauce pan, melt some butter and olive oil.  Brown the chicken breast on each side.

Put in the oven on 350 degrees for 10 minutes or until chicken is done.  Top with chopped sun dried tomatoes.

Served over cheesy polenta! Mmmmm!

 

 

This dinner was fantastic!  Try it, you'll like it!

Chicken Spiedini

 
 This recipe is listed on Domestic Randomness

Italians love their chicken spiedini!  It is so easy to make and so elegant.  My grandmother was a Cunetto (Cunetto's House of Pasta, St. Louis, MO) so this recipe was in her blood!  Here is a picture of my grandmother, with her sister Mary and her mother Rosa Lia Cunetto..........

Aren't little old Italian ladies cute?!!!

Maniaci and Cunetto descendants at the Family Reunion

Here are the ingredients:

4 chicken breasts cut into 1 inch pieces

1 cup olive oil

1 cup white wine

1 cup Parmesan cheese

1 cup bread crumbs

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon pepper

1/3 teaspoon red pepper flakes

Sauce:

1/2 pound melted butter

1/2 cup lemon juice

Here are the ingredients for the marinade

Place the chicken, oil, wine and spices in a Ziploc bag.  Marinate for 1 hour.

Mix Parmesan cheese and bread crumbs together.  Roll the chicken in the bread crumb mixture. 

 Put the chicken on a skewer and broil for 10 minutes.

While the chicken in in the oven, melt the butter and infuse the lemon juice.  Whisk briskly while slowly pouring the lemon juice in.  Pour the butter sauce over the chicken when you remove it from the oven.

YUM!

I served my chicken spiedini over polenta.  DOUBLE YUM!

Mangia!

This recipe is featured on Foodie Friends Friday!