Chop mushrooms and saute in butter with thyme until just brown. Set aside.
Saute shallots in butter and olive oil until soft.
Add Carnaroli (Arborio) rice.
Saute to coat thoroughly, until grains become slightly translucent.
Add cup of white wine. Reduce.
Add hot chicken stock a couple of ladles at a time and stir rice while it absorbs liquid.
Add more stock in batches until rice is done (al dente, or to your liking).
Add the mushrooms.
Add small amount of half/half or heavy cream.
Add grated parm (1 cup or to taste).
Add black ground pepper.
Serve immediately. With steak.
My wife and I do other types of risotto as well but this is our favourite.
I found an Arborio rice that cooks like other rice - e.g., boil water, add rice, cover on low heat, stir regularly - and still tastes great - plump pearls of goodness.
Saute some shrimp, quartered artichoke hearts and mushrooms in olive oil and garlic, adding some oregano and black pepper along the way. Dump in the rice and stir.
Super-easy - maybe 20 minutes. It’s a go-to for an easy dinner that my teenage kids eat…
I typically just do risotto milanese when I need risotto. Saffron, butter, onion, white wine, homemade stock, parmesan. It doesn’t get any better than that. Same basic procedure as yours, minus the cream. It’s quite rich and creamy enough as it is.
I follow Alton Brown’s Good Eats technique/recipe and I had fantastic results the first few times, but the last time or two came out awful. I’m not sure why, if maybe I just got a bad box of rice or was too impatient.
I’m not much of a carrot lover- I picked this one because carrots are one of the few veggies my SO will eat and I wanted something different than the basic risotto. It’s delicious. My only complaint is that grating carrots without a food processor is a PITA. Totally worth it though…
My risotto is usually a way to use up whatever’s in the fridge, say I have a chunk of cheese or some leftover cooked veg, just whack it in at the end. I don’t bother heating up the stock before I add it, I just add a glug at a time and let the heat of the pan bring it up to temp. Never had any complaints!
My wife made one with bacon last night that was AWESOME. It was basically as QuickSilver describes, only with about 1/2-3/4 cup of crumbled bacon and some sauteed mushrooms added at the end. The mushrooms weren’t part of the recipe, but they were kind of old and needed to be used.
Probably didn’t hurt that we used our 29 month aged Parmigiano Reggiano either…
I try something a little different if I can, but one common denominator for me has been homemade chicken stock. I cook the stock for at least 4 hours adding celery, carrots, onion, thyme.
OK, for my mushroom risotto, I differ from Quicksilver in just a few respects:
I use leek rather than shallots
I use vermouth rather than normal white wine for first liquid
I add the mushrooms after the first ladleful of stock not at the end (I think I got that from Oliver)
I put in a knob of butter, not cream.
Only 1/3 cup cheese, more likely Pecorino than Parmesan
Right at the end I add a handful or so of chopped basil
If I’m feeling swish, I might tear in some pancetta or prosciutto as well.
I have no idea. I cook on a gas stove and I use hot liquid to keep the temperature consistently high, and it still takes me almost a full hour once the rice goes in. Perhaps they use a very small amount of rice where as I typically use two cups of uncooked rice.
QuickSilver, any risotto should only be 20 minutes or so give or take (depending on how toothsome you like it) after the rice. The cooking time for the rice is no different than any other white rice, it’s just how much liquid the rice can absorb that’s different.
Okay… it sure as hell seems like it takes me close to an hour to make. And it’s not like I cook it until is like porridge - it still has some bite to it.
I’m setting a clock timer the next time I make it (probably this weekend) and see how long between the rice going in and the risotto going on the plate.
Wait… you guys put a lid on the pot and stir from time to time or are you standing there constantly stirring? Because I do the latter. It’s just how I roll with risotto.
(I don’t really care one way or another, as long as the end product is the same. I’ve had a lot of “risotto” in my time that was nothing more than rice with additional ingredients thrown in. At any rate, covered or uncovered, it shouldn’t take an hour. I do it uncovered at 20-25 minutes.)
