I absolutely love rice cooked in its many varied forms, paella, sushi, curries, fried rice, you name it. And risotto, of course! It is in fact a staple dish in my usual menu. I love its creaminess and particularly that it is possible to prepare it with virtually anything you have in your fridge and pantry (besides the rice and stock, which I always have in stock and some hard Italian cheeses I always keep in my freezer). It is also an excellent option to entertaining, being quite easy to scale up and prepare larger quantities. There are endless options to adapt it to the seasonal produce availability and to your guests taste: vegetarian, gourmet, etc., you just need to use your imagination and play with ingredients, following the basic preparation that remains basically the same. Besides, who doesn’t love a good risotto?
Today I’m sharing two recipes I cooked at home in two different occasions and that we enjoyed a lot. I thought of presenting them together in the same post to show you what I was talking about above: it’s the same procedure, just changing the variable ingredients. Easy and delicious!
Today, in addition to the “print friendly and pdf button” that you can find at the bottom of each post, I’m “launching” a new improvement: the recipes are in a printable format, that make even easier to save or print them. I hope you like it!
Aubergine and Mushroom Risotto
- Servings: 2
- Time: 50 minutes
- Difficulty: medium-easy
Ingredients
- a dash of olive oil
- 1 medium onion, finally chopped
- 1 garlic clove, pressed
- 200 grams of Arborio rice (I used Bomba rice, that I introduced in this paella recipe, is a perfect substitute!)
- 1/2 cup of white wine (I used a Chardonnay cooking wine)
- 1 aubergine, diced
- 1 cup of dried mushrooms, re-hydrated in warm water for 15 minutes and drained
- Salt and Pepper to taste
- 3/4 liter of vegetable stock (keep it warm to avoid interrupting the cooking process when pouring it into the rice preparation)
- 1 tablespoonful of butter (optional)
- Grated Grana Padano or Parmigiano Reggiano
- Shaved Grana Padano/Parmigiano Reggiano/Pecorino Romano and fresh ground black pepper to garnish
Preparation
Heat the oil in a cooking pot, sauté the onion and garlic until translucent. Add the rice and stir fry over low heat, removing continuously with a wooden spoon to allow the starch to release, around a couple of minutes. The secret of a good creamy risotto lies in this step!
Continue by pouring the wine, turn up the heat to let the alcohol evaporate for a few minutes.
Incorporate the vegetables and the mushrooms, season with salt and pepper and pour the stock. Stir, cover and simmer for around 30 minutes, till the rice is cooked. In case it gets too dry during the process, make sure to keep some warm stock at hand to add some ladles, remove, cover and continue simmering.
To finish, turn off the heat, let stand covered for 5 minutes, add the butter, the grated cheese and mix.
Serve with fresh ground black pepper and cheese shavings. Enjoy!
Spinach, Courgette and Mushrooms Risotto
- Servings: 2
- Time: 50 minutes
- Difficulty: medium-easy
Ingredients
- a dash of olive oil
- 1 medium spring onion, finally chopped
- 1 garlic clove, pressed
- 200 grams of Arborio rice (I used Bomba rice, that I introduced in this paella recipe, is a perfect substitute!)
- 1/2 cup of white wine (I used a Chardonnay cooking wine)
- 1 courgette/zucchini, diced
- 2 handfuls of fresh spinach, roughly chopped
- 200 g of fresh mushrooms of choice, chopped
- Salt and Pepper to taste
- 3/4 liter of vegetable stock (keep it warm to avoid interrupting the cooking process when pouring it into the rice preparation)
- 1 tablespoonful of butter (optional)
- Grated Grana Padano or Parmigiano Reggiano
- Shaved Grana Padano/Parmigiano Reggiano/Pecorino Romano and fresh ground black pepper to garnish
Preparation
Heat the oil in a cooking pot, sauté the spring onion and garlic until translucent. Add the rice and stir fry over low heat, removing continuously with a wooden spoon to allow the starch to release, around a couple of minutes. The secret of a good creamy risotto lies in this step!
Continue by pouring the wine, turn up the heat to let the alcohol evaporate for a few minutes.
Incorporate the vegetables and the mushrooms, season with salt and pepper and pour the stock. Stir, cover and simmer for around 30 minutes, till the rice is cooked. In case it gets too dry during the process, make sure to keep some more warm stock at hand to add some ladles, remove, cover and continue simmering.
To finish, turn off the heat, let stand covered for 5 minutes, add the butter, the grated cheese and mix.
Serve with fresh ground black pepper and cheese shavings. Enjoy!
For a quick version, I sometimes cook my risotto in the pressure cooker* (it takes around 10 minutes cooking at full pressure), but take into account that to do this, you need to have tested the exact measure of stock you need to achieve the risotto texture of your like, because you won’t be able to add more during the cooking process. However, you can always use a bit more, and finish the cooking without pressure afterwards.
*Always follow your pressure cooker instructions and manage it with due care.
Filed under: Italian, Mediterranean Tagged: arborio rice, aubergine, bomba rice, clean eating, courgette, Grana Padano, healthy food, mushrooms, Parmigiano Reggiano, rice, spinach, vegetarian, whole food, zucchini
