Polenta for the Good Friday Dinner of 1940

Name: Polenta for the Good Friday Dinner of 1940 (La Polenta du Vendredi Saint de 1940)
Cuisine: French
Ingredients: 3 tablespoons butter; 1 recipe Polenta au Bâton, cooled into a cake; All-purpose flour; 3 tablespoons chopped parsley; 4 tablespoons clarified butter; 2 cups cod cooking water; 1 tablespoon lemon juice; 4 tablespoons flour; 6 tablespoons butter; 2 tablespoons chopped parsley; ½ cup heavy cream; 1 Turkish bay leaf or ½ California bay leaf; 10 peppercorns; 10 parsley sprigs; 3 quarts water; 1 side of a medium salt cod soaked in water 24 to 48 hours; 1 thyme sprig; 2 onions, finely chopped; 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped

La Polenta du Vendredi Saint de 1940

Preparation info

Difficulty
Easy

Appears in

Savoie

By Madeleine Kamman

Published 1989

About

I truly believed that Mélanie could outcook anyone, including my extremely gifted mother, because she found a way to make us love polenta and dried cod all at once. For Paris kids mostly raised on thin bifteck and pommes frites, that was an achievement.

Ingredients

For the Cod

1 side of a medium salt cod soaked in water 24 to 48 hours
3 quarts water
2

Europe
France
Dinner
Fish course
Pescatarian
Savoie
Breakfast
Mediterranean

Method

To prepare the cod, soak it until fully rehydrated. Bring the water to a boil, add the onions, garlic, thyme, bay leaf, and parsley and simmer 15 minutes; add the peppercorns, turn the heat off, and cool to barely lukewarm.

Add the cod and very slowly bring the water back to a bare simmer; as soon as the water simmers, turn the heat off, cover the pot, and let stand 5 minutes. Remove th