Monday, April 4, 2011

Meatless Monday: Mushroom Risotto


I love mushroom risotto. Yesterday was the first time I tried making it on my own. I must say, it's such an elegant dish, especially for being fairly easy and inexpensive.

As it was my first time making this dish, I followed the recipe almost exactly: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Mushroom-Risotto/Detail.aspx

I used brown rice instead of the arborio rice for nutrition reasons. It took a long time to cook with the brown rice, although I'm sure our high altitude had something to do with it, too. It took three hours! By the time it was done, the baked potatoes I served it with went cold. I must say, the deliciousness of the risotto made up for it. It's so good, and I plan on making it again and again. I just also plan on starting it much earlier! I'm also going to add the salt later in the recipe because it might have prolonged the cooking time.

By the time it was finished, we were so hungry (and it tasted so good) that two of us ate half of it. Under normal circumstances, though, I don't think this dish only serves four people as it states. It really makes 6-8 servings, in my opinion. This photo was half the amount of risotto we ended up eating, so you can see it makes a lot.

Here's what you need for the mushroom risotto:

1 tablespoon olive oil
2.5 small onions, minced
1 garlic clove, crushed
1 teaspoon minced celery
1 teaspoon minced parsley
6 oz package sliced mushrooms
1 cup milk
1/4 cup cream
1 cup rice
5 cups vegetable broth
1 teaspoon butter
1 cup shredded parmesan cheese
salt & pepper to taste

1. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Saute the onion and garlic until onion is tender. Stir in parsley and celery. Once celery is tender, add the mushrooms. Reduce heat to low and cook until the mushrooms are soft.

2. Stir the milk, cream and rice into the skillet. Increase the heat, and heat to a simmer. Add one cup of vegetable broth and cook until it's absorbed. Continue adding vegetable broth, one cup at a time, until it's absorbed.

3. Once rice is finished cooking, stir in butter, parmesan cheese, salt and pepper. Remove from heat and serve hot.


If you get four servings out of this recipe, each serving contains approximately 440 calories and costs about $3.50/serving.

2 comments:

Samantha said...

I just made a vegetarian version for my cousin of a chicken broth risotto Jim and I ate few weeks ago. I also used brown rice and found that my cook time was approximately one hour and twenty minutes. My ingredient measurements were pretty much the same, but I didn't put anything except the rice, vegetable broth and added some blanched asparagus, broccoli, parmesan cheese and pepper right at the end. It turned out FABULOUSLY and it was super simple (although took a bit longer to cook). I found it still had that GREAT creaminess because of the slow cooking/absorption process. Yum!

whirledpeas1129 said...

I like the idea of adding asparagus to it. I loved the flavor of the dish but thought I needed some greens or something to balance it out. I think I'll try that next time!