Mushroom risotto

Risotto is one of those dishes that can be very, very good, or very, very bad. At it’s best it’s creamy with a slight bite to the grains of rice. At it’s worst, it’s a claggy lump, or even worse, a kind of soup with undercooked rice in the middle. This particular risotto turned out well, and I thought I ‘d share some tips I’ve picked up along the way to improve my risotto cooking.

1. Cut the onion, garlic, and celery up in a small dice. No matter how good the rice is, if I’ve been lazy with the preparation all I notice is the chunks of onion.

2. Use arborio or carnaroli rice. Regular rice simply doesn’t work.

3. Use a good quality stock and make sure it is hot. Ideally, it should be simmering away on a rear burner while cooking the risotto so that, when adding a ladle full of stock, it will start bubbling in the risotto pot immediately.

4. Shaken or stirred? I tend to stir my risotto, although I’ve recently heard it’s better to cook it in a wok, and toss it to stop it getting gluggy. When I tried this, I ended up with rice all over my cook top, so I stick to stirring, really regularly while it’s cooking.

5. Don’t skimp on the butter at the end. The butter and cheese mixed in at the end, aren’t just about adding salt and fat, they really help round out the flavour.

Mushroom Risotto
Serves Four generously

260 g (9 oz) mixed mushrooms, brushed to remove any dirt and sliced roughly.
3 tablesp olive oil
1 tablesp fresh thyme leaves
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
Juice of half a lemon

3-4 cups good quality vegetable stock, preferably a reduced salt version as the butter and parmesan will add salt as well
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
3 celery stalks finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 cup arborio or carnaroli rice
100 ml ( 3 3/4 fl oz) dry white wine
35 g ( 1 1/4 oz) butter
50 g (1 3/4 oz) freshly grated parmesan
1/2 bunch parsley, washed and cut roughly

1. Begin by heating the stock on a rear burner of the cook top.
2. In a hot pan, add the first quantity of olive oil , mushrooms, garlic and thyme and toss with a pinch of salt. Cook for three minutes, tossing regularly. Once cooked, and the lemon juice. Chop half the cooked mushrooms finely, keep the other half in larger pieces, and set aside.
3. Rinse the pan, then heat again to medium. Add the olive oil, onion and celery and a pinch of salt and cook for minute or two. Then add the garlic. Continue cooking gently until the onion is translucent and the celery softening.
4. Turn the heat up and add the rice. Stir continuously for a couple of minutes to allow the rice to be coated oil and to fry a little. Then add the white wine which will sizzle and disappear.
5. Once the wine has been absorbed, turn the heat down to medium again and slowly begin adding stock, one ladle full at a time. Don’t have a ladle? Try about a third of a cup at a time. After the first ladle of stock has been added, add the finely chopped mushrooms. Stir gently until the stock has been absorbed then add the next quantity of stock. Continue stirring and adding for about fifteen minutes. Taste it at this stage. It should be close to perfectly cooked. Depending on the age of the rice,and the heat of the pan, more stock may be required. Keep going until the risotto has a creamy consistency, with just a little nutty bite to the grains.
6. Remove from the heat. Stir in the parmesan cheese, butter, parsley and the rest of the mushrooms. Cover and allow to rest for a couple of minutes. Enjoy.

This is very loosely adapted from Jamie Oliver