Polenta is cornmeal boiled into a kind of porridge and eaten directly or baked, fried or grilled.
The term is of Italian origin, derived from the Latin for hulled and crushed grain (especially barley-meal).
As it is known today, polenta derives from earlier forms of grain mush (known as puls or pulmentum in Latin or more commonly as gruel or porridge), commonly eaten since Roman times.
Before the introduction of corn from the New World in the 16th century, polenta was made with such starchy ingredients as farro, chestnut flour, millet, spelt, or chickpeas.
The Polentari from Filecchio gave the city a small taste of a forthcoming event – the raduno nazionale dei Polentari d’Italia – the National meeting of Polentari which will be held here in 2016.