BMT Cajun Risotto

A confession to make, before a few weeks ago both Monique and I had never tasted a risotto, nor prepared one. Nevertheless, now I can check that off my top 1,000 food items/preparations that I still want to prepare/eat. In addition, recent inspiration has come from Hell?s Kitchen, only because Gordon Ramsay has the aspiring chefs to prepare the appetizer for just about every meal dinner service. Monique and I have wanted to make and taste this intriguing dish. Note: Click on images for a larger view.

A few weekends ago we had the pleasure of dining with my office group at Pomodoro Italian restaurant in Durham and Monique and I split an order of Seafood Risotto. It consisted of shrimp, scallops, clams, mussels, and calamari with the rice and saffron. Now while we cannot compare this risotto to any other, due to the simple fact that we had never tasted a risotto before, we had no benchmark to compare. I can say that it was not the best dish in the world, most likely because the rice did not have one strand of saffron, but seemed to have been made with an instant mix similar to the yellow rice packets you find in the grocery. In addition, the seafood was not of the freshest quality, I could tell it was a bit old. In any case, it left Monique and I still wanting to try out a risotto.

Now there is the traditional method of making a risotto and then there are variations, and I am sure many more that I can list, including Risotto all?Aragosta {Lobster Risotto}, recently posted by bell?alimento (Italian for ?beautiful food?). So, I decided to make my own risotto and this is what I created.

BMT you say!

Using the Best Ever Three and Four-Ingredient Cookbook as a quick guideline I created my own version of a spicy risotto I?ve name the BMT Risotto, because it contains bacon, mushrooms, and tomato as the main ingredients. By the way, while a new revision of this book is in the works, this cookbook is great if not only for the images, the recipes really seem good too, and it can be bought used for only $8.00.

While this BMT version is most likely not following the exact traditional methods of a formal risotto, it is fairly close. While it may not have the same ?sauce? and creamy consistency that a traditional risotto has; it does come packed with flavor. I suppose the Cajun “Jambalaya” spirit in me has some influence in making this risotto my own. Another thing about this risotto is that I am using long grain rice from Cajun country, Ellis Stansel?s from Gueydan, Louisiana. Monique?s aunt Carol Zech, who lives in Lafayette, LA sent us over a two-pound bag of his rice a few months ago in response to a comment that I had made about some wonderful smelling rice that she had cooked at a family reunion and celebrating her 50th wedding anniversary event back in August (08/2009). This was the first time to trying out the rice, and it is a wonderful grain indeed. Additionally, when my parents came to visit us in October (10/2009) my father Joe Boudreaux mentioned that he had worked for Mr. Stansel on his rice farm during his high school days. Gueydan is only a few miles from Morse, Louisiana, where my father grew up on their farm, they grew rice and soybeans also.

Ingredients


2
Ounces
Black pepper bacon, thick cut, diced


¾
Cup
Red onions, small diced


1
Cup
Ellis Stansel’s Rice


2 ½
Cups
Chicken stock, warm


6
Ounces
Button mushrooms, sliced


¾
Cup
Roma tomatoes, diced


½
Cup
Green onions, diced


To taste
Salt and black pepper






Procedure Steps


1.
In a large sauté pan over a medium high heat cook the diced bacon until browned then add the red onions and continue to sauté until translucent, stirring occasionally.


2.
Add the rice and stir well to coat with the bacon grease and brown for a few minutes.


3.
Gradually add about 1/3 cup of the chicken stock and stir well to spread it out with the rice, allow the rice to simmer, then as the stock is absorbed into the rice add and stir in another 1/3 cup of the chicken stock and again allow the rice to absorb the liquid. Then repeat again with another 1/3 cup of stock and simmer until all the liquid is absorbed.


4.
Add the sliced mushrooms, diced tomatoes and half of the green onions and stir well. Then add the remaining chicken stock, stir well cover, and reduce the heat to medium low. Allow the rice to absorb the liquid. Turn off the heat and allow the risotto to sit for 5 minutes or so


5.
Add the remaining green onions and season with salt and black pepper to taste.

Now, with only 999 food preparations/items still left on the foodie “To Do” list before I die…what can I try next?

The image at the left is the risotto served as a side dish to my dill-crusted salmon with lemon sauce and some steamed fresh spinach, click on the image for a larger view.