Potato risotto

“Chuck’s Day Off,” hosted by Chuck Hughes, is an excellent show on the new (also excellent) Cooking Channel. He’s a restaurant chef, a no-nonsense cook, and doesn’t bore me with stories of his childhood. (And he doesn’t say YUMMO.) This recipe is inspired by him, modified by me, and a nice new thing to try.One curious thing: he said the stock didn’t need to be simmering the way you would want it with a traditional risotto. Ok, I’ll buy that, although I think I’ll still heat the stock so as not to interrupt the cooking with temperature drops.

A word about the sausages. The recipe below is the way I found it on the web. Needless to say I didn't make 10 lbs. of sausage. I had exactly 1.6 lbs. of lamb shoulder. I took my calculator and multiplied each ingredient by .16 to arrive at the proportions I needed. I didn't stuff it into casings; I wrapped it tightly in plastic wrap, put it in vacuum-sealed bags.

Potato and leek risotto

1 lb. Yukon gold potatoes, ½” cubes

1 tbsp olive oil

1 leek (white and light green parts), rinsed well and chopped

4-5 oz. mushrooms (whatever kind you prefer)

4 cups chicken stock

¾ cup grated parmesan cheese

1 cup mustard greens, julienned

additional baby greens as available (optional)

salt and pepper to taste

Bring a pot of water to a boil. Salt it well and blanch the potatoes for 5 minutes.In the meantime, cut up the mushrooms.Heat the oil in a sauté pan until shimmering. Add the mushrooms and leeks, a bit of salt and pepper, and sauté until softened but not colored.Drain the potatoes and add them to the pan. Toss to coat with the oil. Add stock in ½ - ¾ cup increments. Simmer, stirring often, in the same fashion as you would with a regular risotto. When the potatoes are nearly done (softened but still al dente), add a bit more salt and pepper and taste, then add the greens. Let them wilt for just a couple of minutes.Add cheese, taste, and adjust seasoning as necessary. Serve in heated wide bowls, garnished with the scallion.


Moroccan Lamb Sausage
10-lbs ground lamb
3-cups minced onion
3-cups finely chopped fresh parsley
2-cups ice water
3-tbsp salt
2-tbsp cayenne
1-tbsp freshly ground black pepper
1-tbsp dried oregano
1-tbsp dried coriander
1-tbsp dried marjoram
1-tsp cumin

Combine all ingredients, mix well. Form into 8 5” logs. Wrap in plastic and vacuum-seal them in bags. Boil 10 minutes and then brown in butter in a skillet.

Turkey risotto

Today’s recipe is courtesy of Peter. He used some of our leftover turkey thigh meat for this. The method is standard risotto procedure. The result was succulent and satisfying.

Turkey risotto
6 cups chicken stock

1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp butter
½ medium onion, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, minced or pressed
1 tsp fresh ginger, grated
1 cup arborio rice (or other short-grain rice)
¼ dry white wine
salt and pepper to taste
½ cup frozen peas
1 ½ cups cooked turkey, shredded
2 tbsp parsley, chopped
¾ cup grated parmesan or romano cheese

Bring the chicken stock to a boil in a saucepan. Reduce heat and keep it at a simmer.

In a saute pan with sloping sides heat the oil and butter until the butter melts and the foam subsides. Add the onion and cook 3 minutes. Add the garlic and ginger and cook another 3 minutes.

Add the rice, stir, and cook for 3 minutes. Add the wine and cook until it is absorbed. Season lightly with salt and pepper.

Add 1 cup of the stock and cook, stirring frequently, until it is almost completely absorbed. Continue adding more stock as needed and stirring until the rice is tender (about 25 minutes at high altitude (that’s us)).

Stir in the peas, turkey and parsley. Get it all hot and then, off heat, stir in the cheese. Taste and adjust seasoning as necessary. Serve in heated bowls.

The best shrimp risotto you will never make

This is the third in a series of “best things you’ll never make,” so named because the ingredients in our recipes were unique to our fridge, freezer or pantry. Of course you can make a very good shrimp risotto without fennel, ramen flavoring, grappa and cheese. We are ardent fans of Giada DiLaurentiis and she advocates the addition of cheese to shrimp risotto. We like it.

While this was a collaborative effort, the main part of the preparation, and the recipe ingredients, are all from my partner Peter’s efforts and imagination.

We had about 3 cups of frozen lobster stock and made a whole batch more yesterday from the frozen shells of 6 lobsters we consumed over Christmas and New Year’s and our Jan. 3 29th anniversary. After stewing the shells for a couple of hours, removing the shells and reducing by about 1/3, we still had somewhere in the neighborhood of 11 cups. 8 cups have gone into the freezer for future shrimp and grits and who knows what else.

You can find canned fish stock in some supermarkets. I’ve never used it. I think if we didn’t have what we had on hand, I would have used low sodium, low fat chicken stock and added some Thai fish sauce for a hint of seafood flavor.

I also strongly suspect you do not have lobster Newburg sauce in your pantry. A couple of Christmases ago Peter’s mom sent us a package of dried pastas, several jars of marinara sauce and these Newburg cans. It is absolutely a non-essential ingredient, but all the eclectic things Peter put together for this yielded a risotto unparallel in my (our) experience. Thanks, partner!

Just for the record, the side dish is sauteed baby spinach.

The best shrimp risotto you will never make
For the shrimp:
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp butter
10 oz. shrimp, peeled and deveined
1 tsp shrimp ramen flavoring
pinch of black pepper

Heat olive oil and butter until the butter is melted and the foam subsides. Add shrimp, season with ramen flavoring and pepper. Cook until pink ½ way up from the bottom. Turn shrimp, cook 1 more minute and remove from heat and set aside.

For the risotto:
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp butter
½ medium onion, finely chopped
1 cup fennel stalks or fennel bulb pieces, finely chopped
1 cup Arborio rice
1/3 cup grappa, anisette, Pernod or white wine
5 cups lobster, shrimp, or seafood stock, simmering
1 10 ½ oz. can lobster Newburg sauce (available by mail order from the Vermont Country Store)
¼ cup Fennel fronds, chopped
zest of ½ lemon
juice of ½ lemon
1 tbsp butter, at room temperature
½ cup parmesan cheese, grated finely

Heat oil and butter in a sauté pan until the butter melts and the foam subsides. Add onion and fennel stalks and sauté until softened, 4-5 minutes.

Add rice and stir to coat with other ingredients, 2-3 minutes.

Add grappa, anisette, Pernod, or white wine and stir until it is absorbed and evaporates. Add 1/2 cup stock and stir until mostly absorbed. Continue adding stock in ½ cup increments, stirring constantly (the usual routine for risotto).

Loosen the Newburg with some stock and heat it in the microwave on high for about 90 seconds, beating the Newberg with a whisk or fork to fully loosen it with the added stock. About ½ way through the risotto cooking process (ten to twelve minutes in), begin incorporating some of the Newburg sauce with the lobster stock. (You may not use all of it, but you’ll certainly have enough, and better safe than sorry vis-à-vis the quantity of stock required to fully cook a risotto).

When the rice is nearly cooked, still a little al dente (20-25 minutes total), stir in the shrimp. Off the heat add lemon zest, lemon juice, grated cheese, softened butter, and chopped fennel fronds.

Serve in heated bowls.

Giant meatballs, risotto-style orzo with butterbeans, and braised radishes

This will be one of my most ambitious postings. Pazienza.

I dreamed this up over the course of several days. I got a 2-pound tube of Jimmy Dean sausage from the manager’s specials bin at Safeway a few weeks ago and cut it into 2 pieces and froze it. While re-reading a recipe from the NY Times magazine from 2 weeks ago for Chris Cosentino’s malfatti, I found a way to use his concept for great big meatballs.

The picture is, of necessity, a collage comprising photos of orzo, a meatball, and braised radishes. For the radishes I must thank Lydia Bastianich. The recipe is hers. I include it here because this entrée is a one-dish meal for 4 and you’ll want everything if you want to try it.

The method of making risotto-style orzo is pretty standard, except for the (inspired I would say) addition of the butterbeans.

I stake my claim when it comes to the meatballs. A person could certainly make small meatballs, but this was just whimsical enough to amuse yours truly.

Giant meatballs, orzo with butterbeans, and braised radishes
For the meatballs:
1 lb sausage, any kind, casing removed
3 oz. crusty bread, cubed
½ cup heavy cream
1 tbsp butter
½ onion, fine chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
2 egg yolks
1/4 cup breadcrumbs
1 tbsp flour
salt and pepper, to taste
olive oil

Preheat the oven to 375°.

Put the bread cubes into a food processor and only slightly pulse until roughly chopped.

Put the bread in a large bowl and soak it in the cream.

Melt the butter in a little olive oil and sauté the garlic and onion until soft, 3-4 minutes.

Add the sausage and egg yolks to the bowl with the bread and combine.

Add the breadcrumbs and flour and mix in.

Add salt and pepper.

Put 1 tsp of the mixture into the microwave for 30 seconds and taste for seasonings. If necessary, spice it up with pinches of dried oregano, thyme, and/or ground fennel seed; or, of course, more salt and pepper.

Form the remaining sausage mixture into 4 large balls.

Line a shallow baking pan with foil and spray the foil with cooking spray.

Bake the meatballs uncovered until they reach an internal temperature of 165°. Mine took about 35 minutes. Remove from the oven, tent with foil, and allow to rest 5-10 minutes.

For the orzo:
1 cup orzo pasta
½ onion, very finely chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
4 cups chicken stock
1 14.5 oz can of butter beans
2 tbsp butter
1 tbsp olive oil
¼ cup white wine
salt
lemon pepper
finely chopped scallion greens or parsley
1 lemon, cut into wedges

Heat the chicken stock to a simmer and add ½ tsp salt and ½ tsp lemon pepper or white pepper.

Heat 1 tbsp of the butter and 1 tbsp oil over medium high heat. Add onion and garlic, reduce heat to medium and sauté until softened but not colored, 4-5 minutes.

Add the orzo and stir to coat. Continue to sauté for 2-3 minutes. Add the wine and allow it to be absorbed.

Add enough chicken stock to just cover the orzo. Simmer and stir often. When most of the stock has been absorbed add another ½ cup. Stir occasionally. Repeat until the orzo is tender/al dente. It will take 10-12 minutes.

Drain and rinse the butter beans. Add to the orzo along with the other tbsp of butter and heat through.

For the radishes:
1 bunch organic radishes with their greens.*
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp olive oil
¾ cup chicken stock
salt and pepper to taste

Cover the radishes with water in your sink. Gently shake them under the water. Remove and empty the sink, rinsing any grit down the drain. Repeat this 2 more times.

Melt the butter and olive oil over medium high heat in a sauté pan.

If any of the radishes are large, cut them almost in half from bottom to top. Don’t cut all the way through because you want the greens intact.

Add the radishes to the sauté pan and toss them until the greens start to wilt.

Add the stock, salt and pepper to taste, and bring to a simmer.

Cover the pan and braise the radishes at a bare simmer until they are softened but still with a little crunch, about 6-8 minutes.

To assemble this dish, ladle orzo into wide heated bowls. Top each portion with 1 meatball. Place a few radishes next to each meatball and drape the greens over it. Scatter scallions or parsley over everything, sprinkle with a little lemon juice (to taste), and drizzle with a bit of olive oil if you wish. Serve.

*In my experience, the green tops of non-organic radishes don’t cut the mustard. Organic ones are much more appropriate to this recipe. The rinsing is essential. Radishes are always dirty when you buy them.

For a free excerpt of my book, “A Year of Food,” in which I opine, report, cook, muse and philosophize about everything that passed my lips for an entire year, write to me at: scrout1944@msn.com.