Polenta

Melted onto hot cornmeal. The sweetness sits under the funk and holds.

Blue mould melts into hot grain and the sweetness turns savoury instantly.

Corn sweetness only lands when there is enough fat to carry it.

Glutamate is the salt this porridge cannot generate on its own.

Fennel fat runs off the meat and the grain drinks it. That is the sauce.

Something bland and starchy has to catch the braising liquid. This does.

Small roasted birds on a mound of yellow grain, eaten whole.

Sweet corn and earthy fungus: the same alpine plate for four centuries.

Long ragu on soft grain; the starch takes the gelatin and sets as it cools.

Resin herb cuts through corn sugar, especially on the grilled slabs.

Half milk half water: the lactose doubles the sweetness already there.

Wet cornmeal underneath, sweet enough to do the arguing.

Whipped salt fish on grilled yellow slabs. Venice has not moved on.

Iron and sugar. The grain blunts the metal edge without hiding it.

Dissolved in butter it salts the whole pot and nobody tastes fish.

Hot corn starch spreads volatiles further than any risotto does.

Roasted corn and roasted bean share furans. Grits with coffee gravy is proof.