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I made this and it was awesome! I took your advice to add fresh basil and parm, it’s definitely delicious. Thanks for the recipe!
This this this this this! 👆
Do you even need me to say anything else? Can I be excused? I have a ton of things to do today, like mostly make more goat cheese polenta.
Also high on the list today – get back to my real life! which includes writing this post where I will go on to gush about the goat cheese polenta and tell you about my ten glorious non-internet days at the cabin and then get back to the topic at hand of POLENTA GOALS. Somehow that all doesn’t really feel like a real life. But hey. Back to it.
So yes indeed! After ten restful days away from my very professional home office (which is actually a hand-me-down desk squeezed into a tiny corner by the window of our guest room which is currently also triple-functioning as Sage’s bedroom – small house probs), I’m back in action at the keyboard, bribing myself to get back in gear with a coffee and fresh banana bread this morning – tis a blogger’s life for me!
And it’s a pretty happy life right now considering that I am coming off of ten days where the most important things I did were: sitting on the dock, going for woodsy runs, binge-reading all the best mind-candy books, making dinner for my family, and of course, completing my one annual wakeboarding run to prove to myself that even though I now make a living by being an internet nerd, I still have a slice of cool-person youth left in me. STILL GOT IT. Also important: over the course of the vacation, I averaged a lovely ten hours of sleep a night and it was pretty much EVERYTHING. I know. File that statement under Ways To Get People To Hate You.
But also making this morning happy is the fact that the memory of these roasted tricolor tomatoes and sautéed garlic spinach on a creamy pillow of goat cheese polenta is still very fresh, very vivid, very much burned into my mind in the best possible way.
How To Make Our Goat Cheese Polenta:
Alright now. What to even say about this dish? It’s so simple and so SUMMER to me.
Fresh, juicy tomatoes, vibrant green spinach, and a creamy goat cheese polenta – maybe topped off with some Parm and fresh basil from my very own little garden? I dunno. I like to dream big.
We made a few versions of this before settling on this one – and you need to know this: don’t skip the spinach. Since you’ll sauté the spinach with the garlic, it has tons of must must must have flavor. And without it, the overall combination will be yummy but not WOWS yummy for people like use who need that roasty-garlic-depth packed into every bite.
It’s no surprise to anyone that I looked forward to the leftovers every single day until they were gone, and this is evidenced by my lovingly photographed plastic container of polenta and tomatoes and spinach at the end of this post. Plastic food storage container photos? I’m not above that. I packed it all up post-cooking and it looked so pretty smiling back at me from the container with all its rainbow tomato beauty – I just couldn’t not.
It’s not meatless Monday but it’s going to be a meatless win for dinner tonight in our house involving dangerous amounts of creamy goat cheese polenta.
Tomatoes, garlic, spinach, goat cheese –> readysetgo.
Roasted Tomatoes with Goat Cheese Polenta
- Total Time: 1 hour 15 minutes
- Yield: 4 1x
Description
Roasted Tomatoes with Goat Cheese Polenta! Fresh, juicy tomatoes, vibrant green spinach, and a creamy goat cheese polenta!
Ingredients
- 3 cups cherry tomatoes (or small tomatoes – tricolor or heirloom are super pretty!)
- 3 tablespoons olive oil, divided
- 3 cloves garlic
- 3 cups spinach
- 3 cups water
- 1 cup corn grits or polenta (I used Bob’s Red Mill – you can buy it on Amazon here)
- 4 ounces goat cheese
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Wash the tomatoes, place on a baking sheet, and pat dry. Drizzle with 1 tablespoon of the oil. Roast for 10 minutes, gently turn the tomatoes, and repeat until the tomatoes are browned, about 30 minutes. I turned the heat up to 450 at the end to get more browning action.
- Heat the remaining 2 tablespoons oil in a large heavy pan. Add the garlic and saute gently until fragrant, but do not brown – browned garlic tastes bitter and gross. When the garlic is smelling awesome, add the spinach and turn off the heat. You should be able to just keep stirring the spinach around for a minute and it will wilt and reduce in size. Transfer to a bowl and set aside. Wipe out the pan with a paper towel.
- In the same pan, bring the water to a boil. Add the polenta and whisk until smooth. Simmer for 15 minutes or so until the polenta has thickened. Add the goat cheese and the salt and stir until smooth. Taste and adjust as necessary. Serve the polenta immediately with the tomatoes and the spinach.
Notes
The polenta thickens and hardens as it starts cooling – but for this recipe, I liked the polenta soft, so if you need to loosen it up a bit, just add some water or milk and whisk until smooth.
You CAN make polenta just using cornmeal – you can follow the directions in this recipe if you’re doing that. But I will say that I liked using the actual polenta corn grits this time – I felt like the consistency was better.
- Prep Time: 15 mins
- Cook Time: 1 hour
- Category: Dinner
- Cuisine: American
Keywords: polenta recipe, tomatoes and goat cheese, corn grits recipe, healthy dinner
Disclaimer: This post contains an affiliate link for the Bob’s Red Mill Polenta in the recipe! Treat yoself.
One More Thing!
This recipe is part of our easy Italian-inspired recipes page. Check it out!
This looks wonderful! I love that you added plenty of veggies to the base of creamy, dreamy polenta. Glad your vacation was such a success! Everyone deserves down time.
Thanks, Meg!
My mother-in-law just gave me a huge bag of fresh-from-the-garden cherry tomatoes and since it’s 150 degrees outside and hence my brain isn’t functioning like it should I was at a loss as to what to do with them all… I was close to turning them into tomato sauce for a lasagna but thanks to you I can do them justice and try this recipe! Although I have so many I will probably do both…
P.S. Good on ya for keeping that wakeboarding in check! Hope you can hang on to that relaxed feeling as long as possible!
Too many garden fresh tomatoes?? I wouldn’t mind that problem. 😉 Hope you enjoy this, Dana!
Never knew making polenta is this easy. Excellent recipe !!
Absolutely! Give it a try, Mary! 🙂
Woo hoo for vacation time! I had my first unplugged one as well (only 2 days) but it was magical! I am so glad you had a nice time hanging out by the dock and doing ZERO WORK. You totally deserve it!
Now this polenta. It is the polenta to end all polentas. I mean, I’ve never actually TRIED polenta (I KNOW!) but with goat cheese? It can’t go wrong! Pinned!
You’ll love it, Taylor! Hope you give it a try! 🙂
Yum! This looks divine! I love how it uses tomatoes and all the creamy cheese and polenta. Pinning!
Enjoy, Lauren!
Love all the vibrant colors in this recipe! i’ve never had polenta, so need to give this a try! AND yay for getting 10 hrs of sleep every night while on vacay 🙂
Hope you try it out, Ana! You’ll love it!
This looks amazing! I love Polenta and the thought of adding goat cheese to it sends it over the top.
Thanks, Emily!
YAAAAAASSS. I tried polenta in the past, but dove into the polenta game too fast and burnt myself out. When you eat it once a day for a week (without any delicious toppings like ^^ recipe), it’s hard not to get sick of it. I think it’s time to whip out my polenta and grab some fresh tomatoes from the garden and give this a try for dinner tonight!
Great, Christine! Enjoy! 🙂
Any suggestions for adding meat so I can get my hubby to eat this for dinner? Goat cheese FTW. Yummmmmmmm.
Was just thinking this as well! I could easily eat this for dinner, but my boyfriend always needs meat.
Maybe a simple pork tenderloin ( Baked or BBQ) with this polenta/goat cheese/ tomato goodness as a side?
I roasted some split chicken breasts and added those into the bowl.
The great thing about polenta is that it can kind of go with anything! I’ve had polenta served with beef, and it was great. Otherwise chicken or pork (like the other readers suggested) sounds good too!
Make it with a crispy pork belly!!
My take away from this post: 10 hours of sleep! Oh to dream (literally and figuratively!).
So glad you had some well deserved rest!
My other take away: this gorgeous polenta. It has everything I love. Gorgeous!
Thanks, Liren!
I really need to try making polenta. I haven’t even eaten it before! But in this post, your description is perfect. I definitely need to hop on the train.
Definitely worth trying! 🙂
That goat cheese polenta is totally gush-worthy! So gush away! I love simple and tasty, vegetarian pairings like this one!
Enjoy, Shashi!
So glad you’re back! This look beyond scrumptious. Are leftovers a possibility or can polenta not be reheated?
Polenta can be reheated! It will likely thicken or even solidify in the fridge, but just add a little liquid and heat and you’ll have soft polenta again. 🙂
Welcome back from vacation!! I’m happy you had the time to recharge and get away, but I’m SO glad you’re back. I love reading all your posts, and this one looks delicious. I mean, tomatoes and goat cheese, there’s no way I won’t love this!! 🙂
Thanks, Jess!
I’ve never had the guts to try cooking with polenta before – for some reason it scares me – but this looks so delicious, I think it might be time to give it a try.
Don’t be scared, Esther! It’s actually really easy. 🙂 Try it out!
I’m so happy you had a great vacation. It sounds lovely.
What also sounds lovely is this gorgeous bowl of polenta. I love that you roasted the tomaotes to get them all sweet and fancy. This is my kind of bowl!
xx Sydney
Awesome! Enjoy, Sydney!
This looks amazing! Did you eat the leftovers cold or heat them up?
These leftovers can definitely be reheated. If they remain cold, the polenta will be thick and likely solidified. When reheating the polenta, add in a little liquid to get the polenta soft again. Cold or warm – these leftovers will be yummy either way!
Yay for vacay! And yay for you being back! Missed your posts but am so glad you got some down time. Polenta pinned!
Enjoy, Senika!
I haven’t made polenta since my husband died – he was of Italian decent and was the first one to tell me about this glorious food. But seeing this dish and my love of goat cheese, um, I think I may have to dive back into this – thanks for a memory that made me smile today. 😀
Glad you had an awesome vacation – you guys deserve it!
That’s sweet, Biz! I hope you enjoy some delicious polenta in memory of your husband.
Welcome back, Lindsay! And I only hated you for about three, well, maybe five seconds when you said you got ten hours of sleep. I am very happy for you that you got that; it’s something you can’t buy with money! I know you said you were going sparingly on the camera front, but are you going to do a vacation post? I want to set my expectations. 😀 Truth = I want to snoop on your vacation because I’m creepy that way. Plus I want to see your cool girl self wakeboarding! 😉 No worries if you weren’t, I totally understand that, too! 🙂
Polenta/grits is one of my favorite things! So versatile. And it looks absolutely stunning with those juicy tomatoes in the rustic, speckled bowl. Love it! 🙂
Thanks, Margaret!
Polenta isn’t golden because it comes from corn — it’s golden because it is fit for a king. There is no bad polenta — unless you burn it. Last week I made appetizers out of it — OMG they were so good. Growing up the only way mamma made spinach was with garlic and then you took it up another level — roasting the tomatoes. And goat cheese — my heavens my tastebuds can’t stand it. Sheer heaven!. I am so tempted to have polenta tonight. Great recipe.
Awesome! Hope you enjoy it, Marisa!
While I am jealous of your 10 hour sleep nights, you deserve it. Mostly because you continue to make delicious and beautiful dishes such as this–so good!
You are back! I missed you guys.
What a great come back L!
Delicious and full of my favorites: toms, garlic, spinach, goat’s cheese = tomorrow’s lunch sorted 🙂
Thanks for sharing x
Enjoy, Justyna!