Polenta Mais

[Jesse]

I've been browsing the seeds of italy website and came across polenta mais, maize rather than sweetcorn. Has anyone grown it this year and with what success?

[Jesse]

[jennym]

I might be wrong, but I thought that maize (or mais) was the same as sweetcorn, and that polenta is a coarse cornmeal cooked with water or stock a bit like cous-cous.

[Jesse]

I'm not sure jennym, I thought polenta was made from maize which I thought was different to sweetcorn :-\ This is what the website says:

"Corn for grinding into polenta. During Roman times, it was called Puls or Polentum and was made with grains, but when the first shipments of sweetcorn mais came from the new world into Venice, Polenta started to be made with this corn. Dry the cobs, remove the kernals and blitz in your coffee grinder or food processor. Home made polenta is nothing like shop bought !!"

[terrace max]

Isn't maize like sweetcorn on steroids? The 8 foot high stuff they have chases through in old Hollywood films?

[Jesse]

What I remember of maize in SA is the same as sweetcorn but much taller, the corns are bigger and less sweet. In SA they use it to make mealiemeal which is not too dissimilar to polenta.

The reason I ask if anyone has had success growing it here is that I'm concerned our seasons won't be long enough for it to mature.

[sandersj89]

I would expect the season to be fine. Most of the Maize grown in this country by farmers for cattle fodder is cut once the kernals start to dry on the plant.

Jerry

[Jesse]

Thank for that Jerry :)

[westsussexlottie]

Did you grow this in the end? I saw it in this year's Seeds of Italy Catalogue and am interested for next year...

[keef]

I picked some maize from the field behind our house a couple of weeks back for a BBQ, as my sweetcorn was'nt ready. They were OK, not very sweet, but better then i expected, quite nice with loads of pepper and butter, wrapped in foil.

[wardy]

Keef    you cheeky monkey  ;D  Love your avatar  :)

I've seen that in the S of I catalogue and I never even knew polenta was made from corn.  Yet another gap in my knowledge filled  :)

[john_miller]

I'm not sure jennym, I thought polenta was made from maize which I thought was different to sweetcorn :-\ This is what the website says:

"Corn for grinding into polenta. During Roman times, it was called Puls or Polentum and was made with grains, but when the first shipments of sweetcorn mais came from the new world into Venice, Polenta started to be made with this corn. Dry the cobs, remove the kernals and blitz in your coffee grinder or food processor. Home made polenta is nothing like shop bought !!"

They are all Zea mais. There are many strains which are best adapted to the different uses they are generally recommended for. Perhaps the most important factors in a strains recommended use is the moisture content- i.e. popcorn has a much higher moisture content than polenta corn or else it wouldn't 'pop' but could lead to a very messy kitchen if polenta corn had as high a moisture content!