Artichokes and Butternut Squash Risotto

TV and Film star Debi Mazar (Entourage, Goodfellas) and her Tuscan husband Gabriele Corcos make real home-style Italian classics.

“Risotto is one of those weird dishes.
It can be intimidating from the very beginning, when its time to select your rice at your local grocery store...
But at the end, once you get it going into the pan, well...truly,
its only about stirring, adding the ingredients and stirring again, until its ready.
Indeed the final 5 cooking minutes are crucial for any risotto; if you have too much broth in it, the risk is to serve rice soup for dinner, if the rice still requires some cooking, make sure you add very little broth at the end. Achieving the balance between the cooking rice and the broth that needs to go in it, is the only real challenge.

We have gotten a bunch of feedbacks about our Risotto with Sausage and Asparagus, and everybody agrees that risotto, after all, was a very easy dish to cook...enjoy!!!”

Break off the Artichoke stems and discard the outer coarse leaves of the chokes, then cut into thin wedges.

Bring your Vegetable Stock to a boil.

Melt the butter in a large non-stick pan; add the Squash and cook, stirring occasionally, for about 5 minutes. Add a half glass of water to help the sauce, and use a wooden spoon to mash the Squash.

Add the Artichokes and on a medium flame cook for about 15 minutes.

Stir in the Rice and season with salt and pepper.

Add a ladleful of the hot stock and cook, stirring, until it has been absorbed. Continue adding the broth, a ladle at the time, and stirring until each addition has been absorbed.

This will take about 20 minutes (depending on the kind of risotto).

When the rice is tender serve it on the plates and sprinkle the Parsley and some Parmesan cheese on top.

Notes:

Never add too much broth at one time, and always make sure the broth is hot, otherwise it will stop the cooking process. If you already finished the broth and the rice is not yet done cooking, heat up a couple of cups of water, and ladle by ladle bring your dish to the end.

It is a little exercise, but risottos usually benefit from a little burning in the pan. It is tricky, because you do not want to burn your dish, but in between ladles of broth, you can try letting the rice toast a bit on the bottom of the pan, and then scrape it with a wooden spoon…you can do it. You should not over do it!

Never leave your risotto into the pan when it’s ready, otherwise it will keep on cooking …into a mush. Therefore, always move your risotto to a nice serving platter, then bring it to the table.



Buon Appetito,

Debi and Gabriele