Apple and Fig Polenta Torta

Simple ingredients make this exquisite bustrengo cake: Honeycrisp apples, dried figs, raisins, golden polenta, honey, and olive oil.

When you need a little something extraordinary in your everyday life, this apple and fig polenta torta from Romagna fits the bill.

Curls of orange and lemon zest will make you think you've taken a big bite out of summer.

This polenta torta with apples and figs is another Italian fruitcake version, the panettone's cousin, similar to German Gugelhupf and Stollen.

This ancient cake with roots in San Marino, a microstate surrounded by Italy, was traditionally prepared by locals in a fireplace in a copper pot and served especially on winter holidays or Sundays.

The ingredients they used varied, depending on the family tradition, and are known only partly because the secret ingredients are kept jealously by Romagna housewives.

📃 Why it Works

• It's simple and quick to prepare.
• You can modify the recipe according to your taste.
• Dense in texture, it's substantial and best served in small portions; thus, it can feed a crowd.
• It uses inexpensive ingredients.
• Traditionally served on Christmas, this festive cake is eaten year-round.

Each family has its own recipe for bustrengo, which was born as a dessert prepared to empty the pantry and, therefore, with many ingredients. This rustic torta is also sometimes called Pinza, Putana, or Torta Paesana (peasant cake).

Tradition has it that it is prepared with 32 ingredients, of which at least 10 are secret, but the most common is certainly yellow cornmeal (or flour), fruit, sugar, and eggs.

🛒 Ingredients and Notes

• Cornmeal: We used yellow coarse cornmeal, but you can substitute it with white cornmeal, instant polenta, or corn flour (flour milled from corn - not cornflour, aka cornstarch in the US and some other countries).
• Raisins: We mixed raisins and sultanas, but you can use one or the other. If you're not a fan of raisins, you can leave them out.
• Citrus: Since we're only using the zest, it is best to use organic.
• Apples: We love Honeycrisp apples, but there are no rules.

👉 Variations

• Some recipes use dates instead of figs.
• You can add walnuts, almonds, or pine nuts.
• There are some variations with cocoa or using different flour, like chestnut flour.

🔪 Instructions

1. In a bowl, whisk together all of the dry ingredients.
2. In a separate bowl, mix the milk, eggs, oil, and honey. Add the wet mixture to the dry and stir to form a smooth batter. 
3. Finally, stir in the chopped apples, sliced figs, and raisins (reserving a few figs and raising for topping), and zest of orange and lemon. Combine well.
4. Pour into prepared pan, and then top with reserved fig slices. Sprinkle with reserved raisins. Bake until browned and set.

• You can add the figs and raisins to the dry ingredients mixture and stir until coated with flour before adding the wet ingredients. It will prevent the fruit from sinking to the bottom of the cake.
• Wash the citrus with warm water, especially if they're not organic.
• For an intense citrus flavor, double the amount.
• Soak the sliced figs and raisins in water or rum to soften. You can omit raisins completely if you don't like them.
• Take it easy on the portion sizes as the cake is quite dense and satisfying, with a texture similar to bread pudding. 

❓ Frequently Asked Questions

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• Paraguayan Cornbread
• Slavonian Polenta Casserole
• Traditional Bosnian Polenta

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Update Notes: This recipe was originally published in September 2017 and updated in June of 2021 with new photos and recipe tips.

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