Risotto ai funghi

"Mom, what's for lunch?"
"Theres bread and cheese that dad made...make a sandwich."
"No, how bout risotto? Mushroom or broccoli!"

I can't resist that kind of request. Well maybe I can sometimes. Not today.

Risotto is like pasta. Truly you don't NEED the right kind of rice. Short. Long. Jasmine. Arborio. You can even use brown rice (although it may take you till 2014 to cook it). Yes I can hear all you northern Italian friends moaning, all the way across the Atlantic, but it's true. You can manipulate things enough to be satisfied and have a wonderful meal.

This is my fairly easy risotto, made withOUT bouillon cubes (which are health NO-NOs for msg content and sodium)!! Here goes.

You need three things for risotto. 
Rice, a condiment, and broth.

For your broth put a largish saucepan of water to boil with an onion cut in four, a celery stalk, a carrot, maybe a tomato, and if you have it a few peppercorns... whatever. Let it boil for at least 30 min.  For risotto keep it warm and pick out the veggies and peppercorns. Dump the vegs in the compost when done.

About 15 min into your broth cooking, chop an onion and a couple garlic cloves, and two portobello mushrooms. That's going to be my condiment.  You can sub broccoli, cauliflower, asparagus, zucchini, just about any old veg or even leftover roast chicken or a bit of smoked salmon. 

Slice mushrooms about 1/4" thick and then cut into bites. Throw all those into a 4qt saucepan or large skillet with "un noce" of butter. A walnut size piece. About 3 tbsp, and add about three turns round the pan drizzling olive oil too. Each turn round is about a tbsp. Sauté all those veggies on med till everything is wilted and golden.

Now dump in your 3 cups of rice. I like jasmine. I can buy it in bulk. And such an aroma!
Mix up with the butter and oil and veggies, and add another "noce" of butter. You want to toast the rice. It makes such a nice flavor. Don't stir too much. Scrape the bottom and stir, then let sit a minute. Then do it again. Give it time to touch the bottom and cook. (Btw y'all aren't using non stick cookware anymore are you??? Well don't. I use stainless. No worries. No icky scary stuff.) Ok toast about 3-4 minutes. It won't get really brown but it'll start to look dry and brown a tad.

Your broth is done now, and you start ladling it onto the rice. It'll steam and all. I like that part. Put only enough broth in so that once stirred in (scrape the bottom) you still see a slight layer of broth on top. Keep adding broth as it disappears and keep stirring in, scraping up the nice bottom bits, cooking until the rice is nice and al dente. Not mushy. There should still be a little wetness to it. Like there was too much broth. It's ok. Salt and black pepper to taste. Or use red pepper. That works too.

Here's the fun part. Put another "noce" of butter on top, stir in and make that rice all shiny, then stir in a handful of chopped fresh parsley and a nice squirt of lemon juice. Lastly a handful of Parmesan. And let sit for at least 10 minutes. Wow. So wonderful.

This works great with broccoli, asparagus, cauliflower, radicchio, all so good. Broccoli, cauliflower and radicchio should be added more toward the last 10 minutes. Cooking time with broth is like any rice, about 20-25 minutes. It's such a good dish, good as a side or a main course. We had it alone for lunch, and for dinner had roasted meatballs, collard greens and risotto as a side. Nice. And no complaints about eating it twice in one day!
Oh if you want to get really crazy, toast some slivered almonds and top it! Or for that matter put them in the collards!

Buon appetito!!