Risotto Milanese

Here's the nth time I've tried making risotto from the Joy of Cooking. I must say that I really dislike the way instructions are written for a lot of their recipes. I think I finally have the order of operations down for this rice dish. Saffron can easily be one of the most expensive spice to get, but it doesn't have to cost more than all other ingredients in the dish. I used Mexican saffron which still imparts the same warm yellowish coloring to the rice, and has a lightly fragrant scent. Currently, I'm cooking for one, so the list below reflects that. The JoC recipe uses a pound of arborio rice which I don't see myself consuming all at once or even for leftovers. Also, my version doesn't add grated Parmesan cheese. I like Parmesan cheese, but oddly, only on spaghetti sauce. Total cook/prep time is 30 minutes. Risotto can be heated up as leftovers, but it isn't as tasty as other types of rice. The ingredients & directions: 1. In a small saucepan, bring to boil 1 cup of chicken broth and a generous pinch of saffron threads. Remove from heat and set aside. 2. In a large saucepan, heat 2 tbsp EVOO and add your optional ingredients. Today I used diced carrots instead of mushrooms, but you can also use fennel, rosemary, garlic, etc. Let the carrots sweat in the oil until partly cooked but not tender. 2a. Remove carrots to a bowl and reserve. You don't want them cooking the entire time since they will get mushy. 2b. In a separate pot, heat 4 cups of chicken stock and set aside. 2c. Add 2 tbsp butter to the saucepan, 1 clove minced garlic, and heat until the oil is fragrant. Add 1 cup of arborio rice and stir until combined. Raise heat to medium. Add chicken stock, one cup at a time until it has been absorbed by the rice. Add the carrots, salt, and freshly ground black pepper. 2d. Add the saffron-chicken stock to the rice and stir until the excess liquid has been absorbed. Turn off heat and serve. Ingredient summary: 1 c. chicken stock 1 generous pinch of saffron threads 2 tbsp EVOO 1 medium organic carrot, diced 2 cloves garlic, minced 1 c. arborio rice 2 tbsp unsalted butter 4 c. chicken stock, hot salt & pepper to taste A pepper note: I don't have ground white pepper in my kitchen pantry. It's used in so few recipes that I know of that I only have black pepper available. If you don't want to see little black specks in your risotto, by all means, use ground white pepper.

Wild mushroom and curry risotto

I read an article online that if you make risotto correctly, the rice becomes naturally creamy in the broth & wine when it cooks in due to its high starch content; and that you should never add butter or cream as the finishing step. I picked up some arborio rice from Whole Foods today. All the recipes that I came across seemed to have a similar theme going on... Some type of oil + rice + broth >> Simmer >> Add other ingredients >> Add other seasonings >> Simmer >> Add wine >> Simmer >> Serve For this experiment, I didn't use much curry since I only wanted to color the dish yellow and not have a curried rice dish; much like how saffron is typically used to flavor and impart color to the rice in a traditional risotto. This recipe makes 2 cups of cooked rice. Ingredients & Directions: 1 tbsp butter or olive oil 1 c. dry arborio rice Heat a skillet and add the butter. Once the butter has melted, add the rice. No, you're not cooking the rice in the butter. This is to keep it the starch in the rice from sticking to the pan. In a separate pot, rehydrate the dried mushroom with 1 c. boiling water. When softened, drain and reserve the mushrooms. Before the rice has a chance to burn and before all the moisture wicks itself away from the pan, add: 2 c. chicken broth 1 c. broken bits of dried mushroom Cook on low-medium heat and simmer for 20-30 minutes until nearly all the liquid has been absorbed by the rice. If you're going to watch the director's cut of Dune while cooking, stir and check the rice frequently. Add some white wine, no more than 1/4 cup or the alcohol won't burn off before its served When this liquid has all been just about absorbed by the rice or cooked off, turn off the stove and stir in 1 tsp curry powder. The curry taste mellows out when the rice sits refrigerated for a day or so. Salt to taste. Total cook and prep time: 40 minutes Notes: In the mushroom rehydration step, you can reserve the liquid as a mushroom dashi soup base for another dish. The curry powder could also have been added to the butter and heated until fragrant.