Polenta has always been more identified with northern and central Italy, and for anything culinary related to those regions, we always turn to Lynne Rossetto Kasper and her award-winning tome, The Splendid Table, Recipes from Emilia-Romagna, The Heartland of Northern Italian Food. "For many in the Emilia-Romana, it took Post World War II affluence to finally banish polenta as the mainstay of their diet. Since the early 1700s polenta and beans head nourished peasants and laborers, especially in Emilia. The corn was brought from the New World in flourished on the Po River plane. Corn was cheap and plentiful when wheat was expensive and scarce. Before corn arrived in Italy from the Americas, thick porridges of water and ground grain were the food of laborers, foot soldiers, and farm workers. Buckwheat was popular along the Swiss/Italian border. The Romans ground dried beans and ancient strains of wheat and millet. So when cornmeal came upon the scene, its niche was already established. For many, it replaced wheat. Lamentably, corn lacked many of wheat’s nutrients, and pellagra, a disease caused by niacin deficiency, became a major problem among polenta eaters. Polenta is so identified the northern Italy that southerners disparagingly call northerners mangiapolenta, 'polenta eaters'." Polenta can be somewhat soft, or it can be firmer, chilled, sliced and sautéed or grilled, as seen below.