Tomato and mushroom risotto

C made really nice risotto the other time. And since tomatoes, mushrooms and arborio rice were on sale, I decided to try and make some too. :)


Thus I made tomato and mushroom risotto for dinner. Took 2hrs for preparation and cooking. And now I'm really tired. I'd been standing all day (I rarely get to sit at work) .. :(

Well, I used the whole packet of arborio rice which was 500gm. So I have a very large quantity of risotto. There's a lot left..

Tomato and mushroom risotto
Makes about 10 servings

500gm (2 2/3 cups) aborio rice, washed

7 cups of hot water
5 tsp vegeta chicken stock

2 tbsp margarine
2 onions, diced
500gm mushrooms, sliced
1/2 a green capsicum, diced
200gm long round green beans, cut into bite site pieces

pepper, to suit taste
shredded cheese, for serving
washed baby spinach leaves, for serving

Dissolve chicken stock into the water.

In a large saucepan, add margarine and saute onions until slightly brown.
Add mushrooms and saute until brown as well. Then add in green beans, tomatoes and capsicum. Saute for a few minutes, then transfer to a larger pot.

Add the aborio rice to the pot and stir to mix.
Start to add in the chicken stock to the pot, 1-1 1/2 cups at a time.

(This is what a watery mixture looks like)

Simmer the mixture on low heat and mix once in a while. (If you forget to mix, you'll burn your risotto!).

(This is when you can add more stock)

When the risotto doesn't look as watery, add another 1-1 1/2 cups of the chicken stock and follow the same procedure. Do this until all of the chicken stock is used up, or until the rice is cooked. The rice should puff up, be soft and look 'fat'.

Note: Somewhere in between, you can add pepper to suit taste.

Simmer the mixture until it is no longer a soup consistency (like shown above).

Serve on top of spinach leaves, and with shredded tasty cheese. I added more ground pepper on the top because I like pepper :) Mmmm. Peppery