Difference: maize flour (UK), cornflour (US) and polenta

morning glory said:
I give up! I don't like polenta really...
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It's very much like tofu. In the right hand it's excellent. N in the wrong hands it will put you off it for life. We had a meal prepared for us in Macedonia by our hosts mother. We didn't want to disappoint her by saying we didn't like polenta either, but it was excellent and I wish we knew what she did, but she spoke not a word of English. All I know it's that it changed our view of it completely and we now ready it again.
 
Comes down to ground size, cornflour being a finer ground powder.

Whether it's cornflour or corn flour is regional.
 
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classic33 said:
Comes down to ground size, cornflour being a finer ground powder.

Whether it's cornflour or corn flour is regional.
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Which side of the pond controls how much of the corn kernel is used in making the cornflour. In the UK is only the white inside. In the US it's dependent of if it is white cornflour (same as UK and known also as corn starch) or yellow cornflour which is uses the entire corn kernel (hence the yellow colour, I'm assuming that they are using yellow corn to make it and not some other like red sweetcorn which presumably would make pinky red cornflour) which makes what we know as maize flour.
 
Right I did some digging and polenta does/did not actually exist as a single ingredient originally. I'll clarify.

Corn/maize meal or corn flour (US), it's used in a recipe to make a dish called polenta originally. It's a northern Italian thing dish originally. Polenta is not (originally at least) an ingredient.

Polenta is really a dish, not an ingredient, from northern Italy. It refers to a porridge or mush now made from coarsely ground cornmeal since corn was cultivated in Europe in the 16th century, but was also in the past made with farro, chestnuts, millet, spelt or chickpeas. Polenta is usually made from yellow corn.
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SatNavSaysStraightOn said:
Right I did some digging and polenta does/did not actually exist as a single ingredient originally. I'll clarify.

Corn/maize meal or corn flour (US), it's used in a recipe to make a dish called polenta originally. It's a northern Italian thing dish originally. Polenta is not (originally at least) an ingredient.
Click to expand...

Polenta is really a dish, not an ingredient, from northern Italy. It refers to a porridge or mush now made from coarsely ground cornmeal since corn was cultivated in Europe in the 16th century, but was also in the past made with farro, chestnuts, millet, spelt or chickpeas. Polenta is usually made from yellow corn.
Click to expand...
I like the idea that it is 'mush'! That's just about how I feel about it!
 
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