Nachenka - Ukrainian Cornmeal Deliciousness

My grandmother's cooking was unparalleled. Her nachenka was light, buttery and melt-in-your-mouth delicious. I suppose it helped that whatever she cooked required a pound of butter and a pint of cream - she even made salad dressing with heavy cream. That’s probably where I learned to love salad. In today’s health conscious world though, a lot of the old recipes are too rich. Over the years I've had to adapt grandma’s recipes. It’s not the same comfort food she used to make but it's still pretty tasty.

I would describe nachenka as a distant relative of both polenta and cornbread - but way better. My aunt Margaret once said it reminded her of soufflé. Grandma used to add a few eggs, so hers was quite fluffy and probably what aunt M was referring to. 

Paul’s baba used to make something they called “mamalegga”. The way it’s been described to me it sounds like a more frugal version of nachenka - without the cream and eggs - and more like porridge. But that might just be his family’s version.

 
The key to nachenka, according to grandma, was to chop the onions very finely and to cook them until they were transparent. There’s a sweet spot with fried onions that brings out the most flavour - not too brown and not too raw. Start at high heat and then once things start to sizzle, turn it right down. Cooking longer at lower heat will give the desired results. It should take at least 15 minutes.

Adding cold eggs to a hot liquid can cause them to curdle. That's why you need to "temper" the eggs. It dilutes and warms the eggs so you don't inadvertently cook them. How do you do this? First mix the eggs. Then slowly add a small amount of hot milk while continuing to whisk them. You then take this warmed egg mixture and add it back into the rest of the scalded milk.

Another tricky bit is mixing in the scalded milk/egg mixture. When you have added the milk to the cornmeal, keep stirring while you bring it to a boil. Once the boil is reached turn down the heat and keep stirring until the whole thing thickens like cream of wheat and isn’t runny. If the milk and cornmeal don’t form a firm partnership at this stage they will separate out once in the oven.

Great. Now I'm craving nachenka.

Nachenka

In a dutch oven, fry until transparent and golden:
1 tbsp butter
4 tbsp olive oil (add more if the onions get dry)
1 medium onion, chopped finely
pepper (grandma used quite a bit)
1 clove garlic, crushed
salt (to taste ~1 tsp)
Add 1 tsp. white sugar.

While the onions are frying:
Scald 3 cups of skim milk ( I do it in the microwave)
Slowly add 1/2 cup of the scalded milk to 1 beaten egg while continuing to whisk the eggs. Then mix the egg back into the scalded milk and whisk well.

Stir 1 cup of cornmeal into the fried onions until moistened.
Over medium heat slowly add in the scalded milk stirring constantly until it starts to thicken.

Remove from heat. Cover. Bake in 300° F oven for about 45 minutes.

Fry the onions carefully.
The bacon is for something else, but I suddenly had the thought that bacon might be quite nice in nachenka.

Stir the cornmeal into the cooked onions to coat.

Mix in the milk/egg. Start stirring now.
See how it's liquid-y? It needs to thicken.

Now you're talkin'. Nicely thickened. Just stir in that little milk liquid around the edges before it goes in the oven.

Yup. So good.

See. Not much left.