Monday 29 December 2008

sundried tomato, olive, mushroom and artichoke risotto

On Saturday, having not cooked a meal in several days, I found myself with very little food in the house and a need to cook dinner before we headed out for a going away party. As a result, I threw together a risotto made mostly from things in jars, and it's good to know that I can pull together something that's relatively quick and very tasty even when I think I've got nothing in the house.

I had a handful of mushrooms that were getting a bit old and tough, so I prepared them slightly differently from what I would usually do. I fried them for a little, with the onion and the garlic, and then added a little bit of stock to let the mushrooms soften a little, before adding the rice and the rest of the ingredients.

sun-dried tomato, olive, mushroom and artichoke risotto

sundried tomato, mushroom, artichoke and olive risotto

ingredients
one half brown onion (diced)
1 clove garlic (minced or diced finely)
half a dozen mushrooms (sliced)
1 tomato (diced)
half a cup of sundried tomatoes
some artichoke hearts
handful of olives
2 cups arborio rice
½ cup red wine
5 cups of stock


method
In a little (vegan) margarine, fry the onion. As it begins to turn golden, add mushrooms and garlic, and a little of the oil from the sundried tomatoes. Continue to fry until the mushrooms begin to release their liquid. Add a small amount of stock, simmer for a minute, then add the fresh tomato and the arborio rice. Cover the rice in the mixture in the pot. On low to medium heat, slowly add the wine and the stock, one cup at a time, and stir the rice as needed. Keep adding stock until the rice looks almost done. More stock may be required, or more wine. This will take about twenty minutes to half an hour.

Add the sundried tomatoes, olives and artichoke hearts. Continue adding stock as necessary, and stirring, until the rice is soft (hopefully about six or seven minutes). Allow all the liquid to soak in to the rice.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

i've been making something pretty similar lately, which started out as a recipe for 'vegan paella' but i don't think it could really be called paella without the seafood and sausage. it is, as my father puts it, sloppy rice with olives.

when i have fresh mushrooms i like to quarter them, fry them a little in garlic and margarine, and stir them through at the end of the cooking to preserve their texture.

either way it's delicious. love the blog!

Anonymous said...

Looks just fabulous. The add-ins would be great on pizza, too!

x said...

Your risotto looks good, thanks for sharing the recipe!

steph said...

Hi Anonymous: yeah, I'm not sure anything can be called paella without the seafood, but it can still be pretty tasty. :o) When I'm adding mushrooms to a risotto I usually fry them in garlic and yeah, reserve them to add at the end, but in this case they were just a little too old for that to work.

thanks for dropping by!

Ricki, they do make pretty good pizza toppings. D especially likes artichokes with sundried tomatos and avocado with a little balsamic vinegar drizzled over the top.

Hi Mandee, it's pretty tasty! Hope it works for you. :o)