This creamy mushroom risotto is very easy to make, but tastes so delicious, that you can serve it on its own! Risotto for me is the ultimate comfort food: light to eat, yet full of flavour.
I love trying different recipes and this week, I was inspired by watching a brilliant cooking channel with lots of Italian recipes. If you fancy trying a different version of my recipe, this saffron risotto version looks great!
The other great thing about today’s recipe is that once you master the basics, you can vary the ingredients every time you make it and you’ll end up with a slightly different flavour.
I’ve used ingredients suitable for vegetarian diets, but if you want to you can swap the vegetable stock for chicken or other meat stock. It will work equally well.
If you prefer to make this risotto on a budget, you can leave out the wine, but the taste, especially when combined with the cream is just divine! You don’t need to worry about the type of wine you use, I usually add whatever I have in the fridge. The only white wines I’m not too keen on are very sweet white wines, because I think the flavour would not be sharp enough.
Whilst you can play around with the other ingredients, I’d always use the traditional arborio rice. It has the right consistency and enough ‘bite’ even when you saute it with all the wine, cream and stock!
Few tips on cooking this recipe
Make sure you saute the rice first before you add the wine and stock. It seals all the flavour in.
Depending on what type of mushrooms you use, you might need to adjust the time they need to be cooked. Wild mushrooms add the most flavour and whilst fresh mushrooms are the best, you can use dried mushrooms if you prefer. If you are using dried mushrooms you will only need about 1/4 of a cup (or a small handful) as dried mushrooms are quite concentrated in flavour.
Stir the rice through the whole cooking process and make sure you stir it from the bottom of the saucepan.
As tempting as it might be, don’t walk away too far from your saucepan! You don’t want the rice to catch and start burning. Once that happens (and you can tell, I’m talking from experience), the burnt smell infuses the whole pot, so don’t stir it in. Instead, scoop out carefully what’s not burned into a clean saucepan and carry on with the recipe. Leave the burned rice to soak in hot water before washing.
Hope you enjoy cooking this one.
Magdalena
Creamy Mushroom Risotto
This delicious mushroom risotto is easy to make and great to serve on its own or as a side dish.
- 1 1/2 cup arborio rice
- 1 cup mushrooms (choose wild mushrooms for extra flavour)
- 4 1/2 cup vegetable stock
- 1/2 cup white wine
- 1 tsp sea salt
- 1/2 cup single cream or full-fat milk
- 1 tbsp olive oil
To serve
- freshly ground black pepper
- basil leaves
- Parmesan cheese ((or other hard cheese))
In the large pan, heat the olive oil on medium heat and add the chopped mushrooms. Saute for 3 minutes or until the mushrooms are tender and slightly opaque.
Add the arborio rice and cook for another 3 minutes, whilst stirring constantly.
Carefully pour in the wine and cook for about a minute until the wine is fully absorbed.
Add the vegetable broth, stir properly and reduce the heat to low medium, so that the rice is only simmering.
Once most of the vegetable stock has been absorbed into the rice, stir in the cream (or full-fat milk) and cook for a couple more minutes.
Serve with grated parmesan cheese, extra black pepper and basil leaves.