Black Pudding and Pea Risotto

I can’t remember how we came up with this idea, but I do remember that we thought it would be brilliant. It didn’t quite turn out that way.

We started off by chopping the black pudding into cubes and frying it. We had planned to remove these and then put them back in at the end, but we only took half out and left the others in as they had started to break down a bit. Then we followed a normal risotto recipe – added onion, celery and garlic, softened that, then added rice and vermouth and then progressively added chicken stock.

It was at the first ladle of chicken stock that we realised that it was going to look like mud risotto because the black pudding had completely broken down. Not very appetising. We thought that it reminded us a little of cooking with squid ink which isn’t so bad, but the black pudding was a lot grainier.

Anyway, near the ended we added some peas, chopped parsley, grated parmesan, a squeeze of lemon juice and some salt and pepper. It didn’t taste that bad, just didn’t look particularly appetising. If we try it again, we’ll definitely cook the black pudding first, then remove it and put it back in at the end.