risotto

this is really a part 2 to the meatballs, because i used that broth for this. if you want to make risotto and not meatballs, you can make the broth from yesterday and blanch some chicken and pok in it, and then saute it with the mushroom mixture.

so this is based on a mushroom risotto rescipie by tylor florence. i feel i need to defend myself a bit here because i am feeling guilty. a bunch of the recipies i have used recently have been adaptations of work by others, this one somewhat slavishly. i usually do not work from rescipies, but i have been trying to push my cooking ability, and i have reached a point where doing things so my ideas come together requires learning how to make the food work for me on a chemical level.

risotto is a great case in point. though risottos often contain cheese, that is not really what makes them creamy, since the cheese used is parmesean, which has very low fat content. the creaminess of risotto comes from the starchy outer layers of the aborio rice cooking into the fatty broth. this creates a porridge consistency, much liek that found in oatmeal. for my money risotto ought to be in the poridge family, except it is not boiled in milk and so dosent count. I would say the italians found a way to acheive the porridge effect with less work and much less time.

at any rate, when working with a chemical process preportions become important. when one is very familiar with the components one can usually guess and get the prepotions right, but if one has not done a particular reaction before, instructions are usually a good way to go.

so, my adapted version of the tyler florence mushroom risotto. the origional can be seen here: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/tyler-florence/mushroom-risotto-recipe/index.html

4 cups broth from meatballs
2-3 leek greens

olive oil
1 onion, diced, seperated into 2 piles
garlic cloves, minced
whatever mushrooms you have on hand
2 bay leaves
dried thyme
dried parsley
2 tablespoons butter
Salt and pepper
2 cups Arborio rice
1/2 cup dry vermouth
1/2 cup grated low fat chedder
4 well bbqed keilbasa

place broth in a pot and put on a medium heat. using a slotted spoon or a skimmer, fish out all the chunks of king oyster mushroom, be sure to drain all the stock back into the pot, put aside. clean the leek greens, rouoghly chop, put into the broth. the rescipie calls for 8 cups broth, we only have 4 left from the meatballs. so addinig the leek greens will help us grow this into 8. simmer, and add 4 cups of water. after ten minutes adjust the salt and pepper.

meanwhile, take the oyster mushroom chunks. cut them down so no chunk is bigger than a centemeter or so.

Heat 1 tablespoon of oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add 1/2 onion and 1 clove garlic, cook, stirring, until translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the oyster mushrooms, herbs and butter. Saute for 3 to 5 minutes until lightly browned, season with salt and pepper. Drizzle in annother tablespoon of oil if it starts to get dry, then add whatever mushrooms you have on hand. i had maybe 1/4 cup of sliced normal mushrooms from the store that needed to get used up. Season again with salt and pepper. Saute 1 minute then remove from heat and set aside.

Coat a saucepan with 2 tablespoons of oil. Saute the remaining 1/2 onion and garlic clove. Add the rice and stir quickly until it is well-coated and opaque, 1 minute. This step cooks the starchy coating and prevents the grains from sticking. Stir in vermouth and cook until it is nearly all evaporated.

Now, with a ladle, add 1 cup of the warm broth and cook, stirring, until the rice has absorbed the liquid. Add the remaining broth, 1 cup at a time. Continue to cook and stir, allowing the rice to absorb each addition of broth before adding more. The risotto should be slightly firm and creamy, not mushy. Transfer the mushrooms to the rice mixture. Stir in Parmesan cheese, cook briefly until melted.
this part will be hard. i have a local pork farmer who has a stand at the local farmers market. he makes the best frikkin keilbasa, it rules on the grill. i had bbqed it up the previous day, but was too full to eat it. i cubed them by cutting them into four strips, then slicing into centemeter cubes such that each peice has some nice, crunchy casings. as the risotto finishes up, toss in the keilbasa chunks.

if the risotto isnt quite done to your liking, you can add more water, a bit at a time, to get the rice more tender.

eat that shit with a spoon, it goes great with some franks.

put my balls in your mouth

so meat balls. there are a dozen ways to do them, i kinda mixed two and it was alright. used alton brown's take on sweedish meatballs as a baseline but i like my balls simmered in a stock to add flavor. i think it worked out ok, but simmered meat needs a sauce because it can dissolve the fats, and the gravy i made from this was just alright. ON THE OTHER HAND, the stock that resulted from this made an awesome risotto. if my lunch break has time i will post both.

so meatballs

ground chicken

ground pork

three king oyster mushrooms

clementines

manishevets blackberry wine

2 slices wheat bread

an onion

1/4 cup milk

• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon ground allspice
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 2 egg yokes
• bread crumbs and corn meal
• penis in yo face
• 2 bottles ipa
• some flour
• 
  
• get a big honkin pot
• cut the mushrooms into good bite size chunks and throw them in there with some butter, half the onion, and garlic.
• saute that shit till browning happens. when it does, throw in the beer, squeeze in a few clementines, add a good half cup to a cup of the wine, and top it up with water after it starts to boil. i had a lot of trouble getting a good, flavorful broth here. if id thought about it i probably would have tried to use the ve-gan stock from the other day, but i didnt have leeks in the house, so fuck me. anyway, anything you can think of that would go well, add it. i think this actually worked pretty well at the end of the day. simmer it for a good 20 mins, then add some pepper to taste, and a decent amount of salt. my trick is to keep adding salt until all the flavors start to pop. most stocks go for the seawater rule, but i think thats kind of overkill. leave simmering.
• 
  
• rip up the bread and soak it in the milk
• saute the other half onion till its softish, like the democrats on foreign policy
• in a big fucking bowl put the meats, the onion, the egg yolks, the bread mixture, the spices, then mix that shit together. if you have a stand mixer, now would be a good time to bring that out. if not, use a spoon, or get in there with your hands. just up to your elbows in fucking meat.
• 
  
• when everything is mixed well, its time to cook this shit. be sure you have a slotted spoon or frying skimmer handy.
• form the balls into like two inch rounds. you can make them smaller, but this is what i did. as each ball is formed, just gently float it into the stock. when it starts to get a bit crowded in the pot, stop making balls, and wait like five minutes.
• 
  
• here is where i ran into real trouble.
• my balls were still a bit raw when i first pulled them out, so i put them on a cookie sheet. i had to do a few batches to fill the cookie sheet, by which time the first batch had finished cooking internally whilst resting. still, i didn't really have a sauce prepared, so i decided to roast them a bit to get some gravy. this is kind of ass backwards in retrospect. really what i did was roast out he juice from the balls, make them into a sauce, and put them back on top. this is silly. fucking silly. just plain dumb. i should have just made a separate sauce. alas.
• 
  
• so once i had them on the pan, i sprinkled them with the breadcrumbs and corn meal, then roaste them for maybe five minutes under the broiler. pulled them out, transferred the balls to a plate, put the pan on the stove, and opened a beer. using a ladle i splashed some of the broth into the pan, and then a little manichevetz and maybe a quarter cup of my beer. the rest i drank.
• 
  
• using a spatula i deglazed the pan, then i added some pepper, and started sprinkling flower in. gravy is basically a roux, and like with roux you need to let the mixture toast to get rid of the bready flavor. so just let it simmer a bit until it cooks down to a thick paste, but keep it moving with a spatula so it dosent stick. when it starts to stick and/ or changes color, add more broth. then let it cook down a bit, then add more broth, keep doing this till you have a fair amount of gravy at a good consistency. put in a bowl. drink it with a straw.
• 
  
• so that's quite a bit actually! I'll talk about he risotto tommorow.