I honestly haven’t been taking care of my health and haven’t been eating well this week. It’s mostly because of the Stage 4 Restrictions regulation that doesn’t allow people to go shopping together if they’re from the same household. I used to shop alone, but since I’m always shopping for two people, it does get very heavy at the end when I have to walk 15 minutes back home. Before Stage 4 came into play, my partner and I decided to do weekly grocery shopping together every Sunday, and it was great. But now that the ‘1 person limit’ for grocery shopping is active, I couldn’t even be bothered to go shopping alone at all at this point.
Despite the resistance, I decided to go grocery shopping, just a quick one, simply because I deserve a good meal. The weather was looking pretty good, and I felt like taking a walk. We’re at the end of winter right now, so the cold has died down and flowers are starting to bloom for spring. So anyway, I went shopping a little bit and I decided that I wanted to cook Mushroom & Peas Risotto. It looks like an easy recipe, and I don’t need to shop much for this. Let me show you how I made it.
For this recipe, you’ll need :
1. 1 1/2 cups of Arborio Rice
2. 300g – 400g of exotic mushrooms
3. 6-7 cups of chicken or vegetable stock
4. 1/2 cup of onion
5. 1 cup of frozen peas
6. 2 cloves of garlic
7. 2 teaspoons of fresh thyme
8. 2 tablespoons of chopped fresh parsley [more for garnishing]
9. 1/2 cup of dry white wine
10. 2 tablespoons of olive oil [also 2 tablespoons of butter for non-vegan]
11. 1/2 cup of grated parmesan cheese [more for garnishing]
12. Salt & Pepper [Truffle Oil if you have for serving]
Preparation :
1. Thawed the frozen peas. Because if you don’t, it won’t be soft enough even after you cooked it with the risotto for a long time. Trust me.
2. Prepare the exotic mushroom, cut the big one, and tear the thick one into small pieces. Clean and wash them thoroughly. Here in the package that I bought, I got Shiitake, King Brown, and Shimeji mushrooms. The Shiitake is already cut, so I sliced the King Brown and I cut the bottom of the Shimeji and tear them up. Since King Brown mushroom is very tall, I wasn’t sure how to slice it up, so I ended just using half the top of the mushroom. But I kept all of the leftovers from these mushrooms for the stock, so yeah, don’t throw any leftovers, they are FLAVOURS!
3. Finely chop your onion and your garlic (I used minced garlic that’s already in a packaged jar, so much more convenient!). And then also pick and chop your fresh thyme (I used dry thyme) and parsley.
Cooking :
1. Heat 6 cups of stock in a saucepan, you can use a big fire and then turn it off when it starts to boil. Or you can start with low heat and let it simmer until you need to use it. In this case, since I don’t want to spend too much money on buying the stock, I just bought a Litre (4 cups) of vegetable stock, and then I added the rest of the 2 cups with regular water with 1 teaspoon of chicken powder and 1 teaspoon of mushroom powder (totole). Oh, I also put the leftover (unwanted cuts) mushrooms in the saucepan with my stock.
2. In a pot, with medium fire, heat some oil. When it’s already hot, pan-seared your onion until it got into transparent color.
3. Once they are cooked and transparent, put 2 tablespoons, of butter (if you’re vegan, then you can skip this step), garlic, thyme, and all of the mushroom. Sautee the mushroom until they are soft and changes color, and adjust the seasonings.
6. Once the alcohol is cooked down, you want to take two ladles of the hot stock, and pour it into the rice mixture until it covers the whole rice. Keep on stirring, and when the water is almost dry up, take another ladle and stir. You want to do this for at least 15 minutes.
8. Once the rice is al-dente and the peas are soft enough for your liking. Put one last ladle of the stock, stir in the parmesan and the parsley, turn off the heat, and you’re good to go!
