Best (veggie) recipes using instant polenta?

[Lovage]

I bought a packet of instant polenta (the ready made stuff that you just fry/boil/whatever) as part of a general mission of widening the range of things DS1 will eat. But now I'm reading that instant polenta is horrible and you should always do it yourself from scratch. I don't want to give him something horrible or he'll never want to try it again even if I do buy some of the 'proper' stuff later.

How bad is instant polenta? Are there ways of making it more palatable? Surely anything starchy cooked in butter is tasty?! What would you put it with? He likes halloumi and I was imagining that the saltiness of that might go nicely. Unfortunately he doesn't like tomato sauce, which is what I would probably otherwise do with it. Does pesto work with polenta? DS1 will eat anything if it's pesto-flavoured!

[JamNan]

Creamy Polenta
Makes 4 to 6 servings
1 cup cornmeal, preferably stone-ground
4 cups veg stock cube or homemade veg broth
1/4 teaspoon salt (check stock cube is not too salty)

Grated Pecorino Romano cheese (not sure if that's veggie)

Whisk the cornmeal, milk, and salt in a saucepan. Cook, whisking constantly, over medium-high heat, for about 5 minutes, or until thickened. Reduce the heat to low. Simmer, stirring occasionally, for about 2 minutes. Remove from the heat.

It's bloody lovely comfort food. Pesto would work well in an accompanying dish.

And Jamie O's polenta chips with rosemary are gorgeous too (just sub the cheese for a veggie one)
link here

Polenta is good in cakes.

[PenguinsIsSleepDeprived]

I make Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall's polenta fingers.

Essesntially, fry a little chilli and garlic (I just do a tiny bit of chilli, not spicy at all) and rosemary. Cook polenta and stir in your fried bits. Add loads of grated cheese. Pour the resulting 'stuff' onto a plate and chill. Then chop up into fingers. He fries them, but I stuff them in the oven like oven chips. Sounds a lot of hassle but isn't really. Takes 5-10 minutes to make them to the point of chilling, and 2 to chop up and stuff in oven. Serve with whatever you like. He does posh tomato sauce and salad but have to admit we have them as a carb with a whole range of stuff.

[Lovage]

Thank you, those both sound great. I will experiment!

[monostar]

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