Basic Risotto

One of my favorite comfort foods to make is risotto. It is delicious, gluten free, deceptively easy to make (though somewhat time-consuming), and can be very easily modified to adapt to any meal as a side dish or the main course.

When you understand the science behind what makes risotto risotto, you'll realize how simple it is and also that you can make it with just about any type of small starch! Traditionally, risotto is made with Arborio rice. It's an Italian variety with a very high starch content which makes it ideal for this application. However you could also use regular rice, barley, quinoa (really any grain), or even orzo pasta. What makes risotto so delicious and creamy is the starch on the outside of the rice mixing with the hot broth as you stir during cooking, and it turns into a thick, creamy "sauce". So that's why Arborio rice's high starch content is helpful here; to use any of the other grains listed that don't have as high of starch content, you just need to stir more while you cook. Stirring develops the starches and basically pulls the starch off of the outside of the grain so that they can mix with the cooking liquid to form said sauce. It's also why you should not rinse your grain before you use it for risotto - you are literally rinsing off the outer layer of starch, which you want in this recipe!

Cooking time: 1 hour
Serves: 4 as main course, 8 as side dish

Ingredients (note that because this is a recipe of mine, everything listed below shallot is a close approximation... a little more or less of anything based on your taste preferences would be fine!)
2 cups Arborio rice
5 cups chicken broth
1 shallot, minced
2-3 cloves of garlic, pressed
1/3 dry white wine
3 tbsp lemon juice
2 tbsp + 4 tbsp butter, cut into 1-tbsp pieces
2 tbsp olive oil (plus more for finishing)
1/3 cup parmesan cheese
Salt and pepper to taste

1. Heat 2 tbsp butter and 2 tbsp olive oil in the bottom of a medium sized pot 
2. In a medium sauce pan, heat the broth until simmering 
3. Mince shallot, press garlic. Add minced shallot to the hot oil and melted butter with a pinch of salt (in this case, we do not want to brown the shallot, we want to sweat it. Remember from the French Onion Soup post that salt prevents / delays browning and allows for sweating instead). Cook for ~5 minutes, or until shallot becomes translucent. Once shallot is translucent, add garlic, stir, and cook for another 60 seconds
4. Add Arborio rice and stir so that each grain of rice is coated in fat. Cook for ~5 minutes stirring occasionally to toast the rice. When it smells nutty, you're ready for liquids
5. First, add the white wine and lemon juice, and stir till absorbed. (note: if your garlic turns blueish green at this point, it's weird but perfectly normal. It's a reaction that happens when fresh garlic comes in contact with an acid like lemon juice or white wine. Embrace it!)
6. Once absorbed, add the hot chicken broth to the rice mixture one ladleful at a time, stirring after each addition. With each ladle of broth you add, stir until the rice has fully absorbed it. Once there is no remaining liquid, add another ladle of hot broth, stir until absorbed. This is the time consuming part, because it's not a recipe where you can "set it and forget it." It requires babysitting - you're stirring basically the entire time, because that's what develops the starches and turns them deliciously creamy.
7. Continue adding chicken broth one ladle at a time until rice has fully absorbed all the liquid. When you have used up ~80% of the liquid, taste the rice - you may be done! You've heated an extra cup of broth just in case you need to cook it for longer, so be sure to taste for yourself and see.
8. After all of the broth has been absorbed and the rice is cooked and tender, you're going to add a bunch of fat to finish off the risotto. This adds something called "mouthfeel" which is the textural aspect of fatty foods that make us love them so much - think melted cheese, buttered toast, etc. So add your other 4 tbsp of butter and the parmesan cheese, and stir till melted and combined. Add salt and pepper to taste.
9. After serving into individual dishes, you're going to top it with what Anne Burrell calls your "big fat finishing oil." This will be a fresh oil with a bold flavor that again adds mouthfeel and also rounds out the flavor or a dish like this one. For risotto, my favorite finishing oil is a truffle oil... incredibly delicious. If you don't have truffle oil on hand, you can use any good, fresh, Extra Virgin Olive Oil. Just give it a drizzle over the top of each serving.

This is the recipe for a truly basic risotto. Trust me, it's delicious just like this. But I rarely make it like this - I almost always have additions! My most common addition is fresh thyme - the flavors are so complimentary, and it's such a simple thing to add. Fresh thyme also goes very well with all of my other common additions I'll list below - for the sake of completeness, assume that for every addition below it also says "leaves of ~2 sprigs of fresh thyme". 

Variations:

• Butternut squash (can also use sweet potato) - cut into 1/2 inch dice and either roast, or add it to the broth as it simmers and by the time you run out of broth, your squash/sweet potatoes will be tender and ready to add too! This is one of my absolute favorite fall recipes!!
• Asparagus - cut into 1-inch spears (if you want to get fancy, cut it on a bias) - same as above, either roast or simmer in the broth (will only need about ~5 mins to simmer, so add it when you're through 3/4 of the broth. If you add it at the beginning like the squash or sweet potatoes, it'll be over-cooked)
• Mushrooms - my favorite for this recipe is cremini or Baby Bella mushrooms, though you could use any! Clean by wiping with a damp paper towel to remove the dirt (never rinse or soak mushrooms in water - they absorb a lot of the water, turn rubber, and take much longer to roast), slice, drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and roast in the oven until shriveled and darker brown. Then toss them in with the last 1 or 2 ladles of broth. This also goes well with the asparagus too. Adjust seasoning accordingly in your risotto, because these will get very salty as they roast down, so you'll need less salt added directly to your rice
• Peas - toss in some frozen peas with the last few ladles of broth. Those would be the tastiest in my opinion, but just about any frozen veggie would be a good, healthy addition!
• Pancetta - crisp diced pancetta in a sautee pan, then add at the end. Goes well with peas or asparagus
• Italian Sausage - remove sausage from casing and brown in a sautee pan. Goes well with peas, asparagus, or mushrooms (if doing sausage, don't salt the mushrooms before you roast them - otherwise your final risotto will be too salty. I personally don't like sausage so haven't done this one, but I've seen it on menus and I'm sure it's tasty if this is your thing)
• etc. etc. etc... the possibilities are endless!! 
• Any other additions you think would be good? Share them in the comments below!

Shallots and garlic sweating in olive oil and butter, ready to add the rice

Arborio rice added, ready to add the flavoring liquids!

Here are my liquids. I usually have containers of homemade chicken broth in the freezer but I had just run out, so I used Better than Bouillon instead - not a bad substitute!! 

Adding the broth one ladleful at a time - not pictured here, small sauce pan on the left-hand burner with the broth simmering away.

 This is after about 1/2 of the broth had been added and stirred. You can see it's been absorbed, and we're ready to add more.

My finishing ingredients

La piece de resistance... truffle oil

The final product - a basic risotto. The possibilities are endless in terms of things you can add to this, but even the basic recipe is a delicious comfort food that I love to make!!