Gelatinizing Yellow Corn Meal

I wanted to brew a cream ale and didn't have flaked corn so I bought some yellow corn meal (degerminated). I knew it needed to be cooked to gelatinize the starch, so first I put some in water and tried to heat it. That scorched right away and I had to throw that out. My second attempt was to boil water, take it off the heat and add corn meal. This seemed to work well enough, it got very thick and sticky. I let it sit overnight and then added it to my mash the next morning. The result was a super-stuck mash so I don't know if this temp was enough to completely gelatinize the corn or not. I read it takes 190F and it certainly was that hot at the beginning but maybe not for a long time.

Any advice on how to use corn meal?

I use raw #2 field corn and cereal mash it with 10% malt. I have excellent efficiencies this way.

What are the details of your cereal mash?

I have had great success using instant grits instead of corn meal in a cream ale. No cooking required, just throw it in the mash.