Wild Risotto

Here is my second entry to the Risotto Cookoff!

This is risotto with wild rice, wild mushrooms, and asparagus.


Ingredients:
1.5 cups Arborio rice
2/3 cup Wild Rice
Large Onion diced
few cloves garlic
2 oz dried mushrooms of your choice (I used a blend)
1lb of asparagus
Vegetable stock or bouillon
1/2 cup Dry Vermoutholive oil
3 Tb butter
~3/4 cup grated parmesan
Thyme
Parsley
Salt
Black Pepper

First off, reconstitute the mushrooms and start cooking the wild rice. It takes 50-60 minutes for the wild rice. You want it to be nice and chewy, but not underdone. Cut the asparagus into sizes of your liking, stopping where the asparagus gets white, thick, and hard (yeah, I said it). These remaining pieces will go into the stock that you'll be adding to the risotto. Blanch the asparagus in a few cups of water. Save the nice green water and keep it simmering. To this, add a ladle (1/2-2/3 cup) of the delicious reconstitution water from the mushrooms. Add some vegetable or chicken stock to the simmering water to bring the total to 4-6 cups. Throw in the uncooked asparagus for a little more asparagusy goodness.

In a wide bottomed pan, soften the onions in olive oil. While softening, generously sprinkle on some dried thyme and chopped parsley. Freshly ground black pepper would be a good addition here, and a pinch of salt. Add minced garlic a little bit before you're happy with the onions to finish the nice aromatic backbone. Chop up the bigger mushrooms and throw them into the pan (after straining the water from them of course). Let them get some oil on them and then throw in the arborio. Toast this for 3-4 minutes, moving it around a lot.

Around this time, your wild rice should be done or about done. What do you do if you have left over water in the rice? Yep, throw the water into the simmering stock.

Don't let the rice get brown, you just want it heated a little and coated in oil. Add the vermouth and stir, letting it evaporate. Add a ladle and a half of the stock and stir. Keeping the heat on medium worked for me. I've had it too high and then the outside of the rice gets mushy while the inside is still dry. Do what works best for you! Once that evaporates (keep stirring) add another ladle and a half of the stock. Repeat with a ladle full each time (I read to start out adding more stock at a time early on, but reduce the amount to a ladle later on, worked well for me this time). You can tell when the risotto is ready for more liquid when you move your wooden spoon to clear the center of the pan and the rice and liquid doesn't move to fill up your path right away. Keep doing this and start tasting once you've used half of your stock. Cook to al dente.

Remove from the heat and add in the blanched asparagus and the wild rice. Stir and add the butter and the parmesan (I just added the parmesan to taste... probably around 1/2-3/4 cup). Add plenty of salt and pepper to taste.


Mushroom blend I got. I can never decide which mushrooms to buy so I got the Monterrey blend. They actually put in several Morels!


Mushrooms reconstituting in a succulent stew of their own juices. Don't forget to add some to the stock.


Aromatic backbone. Could have used more parsley and maybe some more thyme.


In progress.


Awesomely out of focus picture of the wild rice. This was cooked perfectly! Chewy, nutty, amazing.


You can never have too much parmesan.



Garnish with more parmesan and some parsley.

This was the best risotto I've ever made. I looked up some tips on making a good risotto and they worked great. I had the heat on too high and added stock too quickly and got mush. Both rices were cooked perfectly.

The creamy, rich arborio was the perfect counterpoint to the chewy wild rice. The bright, fresh flavor of the asparagus water and thyme really contrasted well with the earthy mushrooms darkness. The familiar fibrous asparagus balanced out the textural assault of the two battling rices.