Risotto for Dessert: How Sweet It Is!

Mushroom risotto.  Risotto with peas and asparagus.  Classic risotto flavored with saffron.  Sure, you’ve heard of these.  Risotto is a classic preparation that is a textural marvel–a slight Crunch wrapped in fluffy-smooth-Creamy wrapped in rich-silky-Flowing.  It’s the Diminutive Turducken of sides (and mains, for that matter).

When I helped open a restaurant, the owner/pastry chef wanted an orange-cardamom rice pudding on the menu.  A Lovely Idea, indeed.  I piped up with “Hows about we make that like risotto?”  We looked at each other and wondered if we Could.  Neither of us had ever made a sweet risotto, but that’s the fun of planning a menu.  You come up with an Idea, and you try it.  So, we tried it, and we were Pleased with the Results.  Not just a little pleased, but Ridiculously Pleased.  If you’re not convinced, think of it as a “stirred rice pudding.”

I’m not going to give you a recipe, because this is more about technique.  Take some fatty dairy, flavor it and sweeten it however you’d like, heat it to a simmer and then Make Risotto with it.  For an extra burst of Richness, temper the sweet risotto into a couple of egg yolks and make sure it reaches 160F before chilling.

Let’s do this:  I’ll give you the ingredients for a “traditional” risotto, and then we’ll sub out some Desserty Ingredients for the savory ones.  By the way, this particular list o’ ingredients is snagged from a keen little book called Pilaf, Risotto, and Other Ways with Rice by Sada Fretz.

Risotto Primavera

1/2 pound fresh asparagus
1/2 pound fresh green beans
1/3 cup pine nuts
2 TBSP olive oil
2 TBSP butter
1 small leek
1 small zucchini
1 1/2 cups arborio rice
1/2 cup dry white wine
5 cups homemade vegetable broth
1 cup shelled fresh peas
3 fresh plum tomatoes
1/4 cup chopped basil leaves
1/4 cup heavy cream, optional (but not really)
1/3 cup Parmesan=Reggiano cheese
salt and pepper, to taste

That’s a crazy-big List of Stuff, huh?  Let’s simplify it a bit:

Streamlined Risotto Primavera

mixed vegetables
some aromatics
a little crunch
fat
rice
liquid
more fat
seasonings

We don’t want no Veggies in our Dessert Risotto.  Not today, anyway.  Let’s try this:

Dessert Risotto PrimaPMAT

mixed fruits–dried and fresh
spices to toast up–maybe some cinnamon and star anise?
crunchy–how about some toasted nuts.  You can use the pine nuts, but consider almonds or macs, too.
fat–check.  Let’s go with clarified butter–ooh, browned butter!  Even better.
rice–stick with arborio in the US.  Widely available and Good for Risotto.
alcohol–sweet dessert wine?  Port?  Leave it out?  Maybe just a hit of vodka–carefully–to release some alcohol soluble flavors?
Liquid–sweetened dairy.  A mixture of sweetened condensed milk, coconut milk and heavy cream sounds good.  What do you think?
More fat–enrich with some coconut cream or mascarpone or an egg yolk or two.  Some whole butter could work.  Leave it out if you must–after all, we’ve already used fatty stuff for the cooking liquid.
seasonings–since we’re using spices as our aromatics, let’s call seasonings flavor accents.  Toasted coconut?  Crystallized ginger?  Kaffir lime leaves?  And don’t forget the salt.  Seriously.

Here’s how to put it together.

Toast spices in browned butter.
Stir in dry rice and stir until rice turns opaque.  Add some salt, please.
Hit it with the alcohol–off the heat if using some crazy flammable stuff–and reduce to dry.
Start adding the heated dairy, a bit at a time.*
Stir in dried fruits towards the beginning and the fresh fruits towards the end.
At the end of cooking, enrich with some butter or other Appropriate Fat.
Taste and correct seasonings.  Make sure there’s enough salt in it.
Stir in some toasted coconut, toasted nuts, or whatever you’ve come up with.

If you’re serving it warm, just go for it.  To serve chilled (how we made it), add extra dairy so it’s soupier than you want, then chill.  It will thicken as it cools.

This is not Diet Food.  You could make it a little less Egregious, calorie-wise, by using some sort of juice or even water for the majority of the cooking process and then just enrich with some fatty goodness towards the end.  For me, I’ll go full fat.  It’s not like I’ll be eating this every day.  Maybe.

Have I tested this particular recipe?  Nope.  I’m just trying to give you a springboard for your own ideas.  What I can tell you is that our orange-cardamom risotto was fantastic.  If you’ve never considered a Dessert Risotto, I’m glad to have introduced you to the idea.

That’s it; I’m done now.  I’ll let this lady take over–here’s a great primer on how to put a risotto together.  Great information.

*Use full-fat dairy so your mixture doesn’t curdle.  Keep everything at a simmer, not a crazy boil.