Simple Risotto

So why the hell would you listen to me about making food? I slice open my thumb and have food accidents. Reasonably, you probably shouldn't. But a person you should listen to is Amanda Freitag, and I'm using a slightly modified version of her recipe, here. I highly recommend her book, The Chef Next Door. It's designed for home cooks with little to no experience and has improved my cooking skills immensely. In short, when I do what she says, 95% of the time it turns out awesome.

So. If you too would like awesome food, try this:

You will need:

4 cups of Chicken or Vegetable stock.

 Amanda has a recipe for making stock and Anthony Bourdain would give me serious side-eye for using store bought stuff, but if I'm making this, I'm typically in a hurry. Also, I hardly ever make chicken, so the prerequisite 5 pounds of chicken bones just isn't something I have. Amanda also basically says, hey, it's your kitchen, use store bought stock if you want.

4 Tablespoons Unsalted Butter and a Large Onion

You can get away with one tablespoon, but one thing Bourdain does approve of is adding a fuckton of butter to your food.

1 Cup Arborio Rice

 Actually, there are three kinds of rice that can be used to make risotto. Arborio is one of them, but there is also Vialone Nano and Carnaroli.

Salt and Pepper

I'm breaking with tradition here, but I added a cup of shredded Asiago at the end.

 

 Before you do anything else, chop and peel the onion:

Pour the stock into a pot and heat it over low heat. Melt the butter in another pot, again over low heat.

Add the onion and a pinch of salt. Saute until translucent, making sure it doesn't brown.

Add the rice and stir to coat it with butter.

Add a cup of hot stock to the rice. Stir and simmer over medium-low until the stock is absorbed into the rice. Repeat this process until the stock is gone and the rice is cooked. Pour in the Asiago and season with salt and pepper.

 Serve!