Polenta Cupcakes Morphed Into Corn Muffins - A Story with a Moral

Polenta cupcakes seemed like a good idea. My Taste & Create partner this month, My Kitchen Treasures, had a recipe for a date, ricotta, and polenta cake that sounded like it would be a winner in cupcake form. I decided that I would give it a try using mangoes instead of dates.

First, I made some polenta.

And there - right there in the very first step - is where I went wrong.

You see, when the recipe called for polenta, it was referring to uncooked polenta (essentially corn meal), not the cooked, fluffy stuff that I posted about last week - oops!

Fact: Almost all cupcake recipes take about 20 minutes to bake.
Fact: My polenta cupcakes were still raw on the inside at 45 minutes in the oven. Cooked polenta = too much moisture.

But Then, The Miracle Happened

After one hour in the oven, I had basically given up on my poor polenta cupcakes and was about to throw them all in the trash when Jonathan tried one and noted that it tasted like a corn muffin. I had a bite and had to agree. They were sweeter than a typical corn muffin and moist rather than crumbly, but if I thought of them as corn muffins, not cupcakes, they were rather tasty. Rather than trashing them or frosting them, I left them naked, called them corn muffins, and served them with the main course to our dinner guests.

The Verdict: Our guests loved them! They even went back for seconds.

When I told our friends the story and asked whether the recipe was good enough to post on the blog, they said, "Definitely."

The Moral of the Story

Don't give up just because something doesn't go the way you had planned; you might just discover something new and exciting!

The "Corn Muffin" Recipe


As I said above, this recipe is a modification of the date, ricotta, and polenta cake from My Kitchen Treasures. I encourage you to check out the recipe in its original form and give that a try as well.

Makes about 15 muffins

For The Muffins

• 2 C flour
• 1 t baking powder
• 2/3 C cooked polenta
• 1 C sugar
• 1 1/4 C ricotta cheese
• 1/2 C butter, room temperature
• 3/4 C water
• 1 C finely chopped mango

For The Filling

• 1 C ricotta cheese
• 1 t vanilla extract
• 2 T powdered sugar

1. Combine flour, baking powder, polenta, sugar, cheese, butter and the water in large bowl, and beat on low speed with a electric mixer until combined.
2. Fold in mango.
3. Fill cupcake liners half full with batter.
4. In a small bowl, mix all filling ingredients.
5. Spread a thin layer of filling over each filled muffin.
6. Top off each muffin with remaining batter until they are all 3/4 full.
7. Bake at 375 F for about one hour.
   

About the Plates

The plates you see in these photos were a gift from Marx Foods. They are disposable palm leaf plates.

According to the info on Marx's website:

These environmentally friendly small hexagonal palm plates are made from a natural, renewable, and biodegradable raw material. Naturally discarded sheaths of the leaves of the Adaka palm tree, which in the course of its biological life cycle, dry, fall and regenerate, are collected. No trees are cut down. The palm sheaths are then cleaned in fresh spring water and molded into bowls.

Palm leaf plates are leak proof and able to withstand hot and cold temperatures without getting soggy or flimsy. They are smaller than our full sized Hexagonal Palm Leaf Plates and thus perfect for salads and side dishes.

Even though these are disposable plates, each durable piece is unique with an attractive wood pattern finish that fits into both rustic and elegant events.

I was very impressed with the quality of the plates. They were super thick! Also, aside from the fact that they are environmentally friendly, they are gorgeous - perhaps even too gorgeous to throw out. The good news is that we didn't have to throw them out!

Even though the palm plates were billed as disposable, there is no reason that you have to trash them after one use. We used them for the muffins and for some greasy pizza and we were still able to rinse them off, let them dry, and use them again. I think we should be able to get many more uses out of them before having to pitch them. We did, however, give up one of our plates because a friend wanted to feed it to her compost worms and see how they liked it. I haven't heard the report on how that went yet.

The plates are available for sale on the Marx Foods website.

How to Cook Polenta

How to Cook Polenta To find out how to cook polenta, I headed to Eating Out Loud. I needed to find out how to cook polenta because my next cupcake has polenta as an ingredient. Since I was making polenta anyway, we decided to have it for dinner. Polenta is a cheap and easy way to have a dinner that looks incredibly gourmet. For the best effect, be sure to call your polenta dinner "polenta with ragout and pan seared beef" rather than "cornmeal with tomato sauce and hamburger meat." Polenta Recipe Cooking polenta is really easy, and the best part (depending on how you look at it) is that you can cook polenta instead of taking a trip to the gym. It involves stirring a very heavy cornmeal mush for about thirty minutes - an incredible arm workout! First, you'll need to buy some uncooked polenta. Polenta is essentially cornmeal, and any old cornmeal would work just fine. However, according to a helpful discussion thread on Chowhound, polenta has more of a standardized grain size. I purchased my uncooked polenta from the bulk bin at Whole Foods. Bob's Red Mill also sells it. Below you'll find the polenta cooking technique as found on Eating Out Loud, along with my notes.

• 6 C water
• 1 t salt
• 2 C uncooked polenta (any cornmeal will work)
• 3 T unsalted butter

1. Heat water with salt over high heat and bring to a boil.
2. Stir in polenta and reduce to a simmer. It’s important at this point to keep the mixture moving using a strong wooden spoon.
3. Stir for about 30 minutes — the mixture will thicken immediately, but the consistency and thickness will continue to develop during the 30 minutes. It’s important to keep stirring, don’t give up. (I wanted to give up. I wanted so much to give up. I ended up having my husband help out. He's made polenta before and never stirred for thirty minutes. He didn't see the point until it was all done and the consistency was perfect! If you prefer more of a soft polenta, then I give you the OK to quit.)
4. After 30 minutes, stir in butter until blended.
5. Pour the polenta into a greased baking dish and allow to cool for at least 10 minutes. The polenta will become firm and can be sliced at this point.
6. The polenta can be refrigerated or frozen for later use.

Coming Up Next Coming up next, I've got a post about polenta cupcakes that somehow morphed into awesome moist corn muffins.