Friday, July 16, 2010

Raving about Risotto!

Well the wonderful world of Wikipedia tells me that Risotto is defined as a traditional Italian rice dish cooked with broth and flavoured with parmesan cheese and other ingredients which could include meat, fish or vegetables. The name literally means 'little rice.' Interestingly enough I have had a love / hate relationship with risotto I think because whilst I used to love ordering (and eating) it when I was out and about, I had always been told it was ridiculously hard to cook, and since beginning my weight loss journey two years ago I had also been told that it was mighty unhealthy, serious loss of brownie points for the humble risotto right there. Anyway recently I was flicking through a Recipes + magazine and found a recipe for Oven Baked Tuna Risotto....it sounded relatively simple, no cream, no wine, parmesan cheese only as an optional garnish....plus my OH was working away this week so I thought it was the perfect time for an experiment! On Monday night I set myself up with all my ingredients - tuna, capsicum, onion, zucchini, diced tomatoes, stock and most importantly the arborio rice! All very simple, chop up the capsicum, onion and zucchini, saute in a pan, add the diced tomatoes, rice and the stock, bring it to the boil....then chuck it in the oven for 20 mins...how super duper easy is that?! However, upon tasting at the 20min mark it was a little bit bland, so I added some tomato paste and some wet mediterranean herbs, stirred through the tuna and chucked it back in the oven.....waiting waiting waiting......and when I pulled it out of the oven may I saw I was astounded, the liquid was absorbed, the rice was tender and the flavour was delicious! I was glad my OH was away so I didn't have to share! And best of all I had made enough for several nights....nom nom nom. So needless to say my risotto cherry has been popped and I don't know what I was so worried about! It was low calorie and dead easy! Next week I am going to attempt it again, maybe with some pumpkin and spinach or something, OH wants evidence I can actually make it!

What else did I make....ohh a dead easy Honey Rice Bubble Slice. Now usually OH has a rice bubble slice in his lunches that involves melting marshmallows with butter and stirring them through rice bubbles and letting it set. However, I get bored cooking the same thing all the time so was on the look out for something different to do with the abnormally large box of rice bubbles in the cupboard. That was when I found the Honey Rice Bubble Slice recipe on http://www.bestrecipes.com/ . All it involved was honey, butter and sugar all melted together and mixed through some rice bubbles and then letting it set over night. The original recipe involved coconut mixed through at the end, but OH is funny about it getting stuck in his teeth so I left it out (he is also funny about cross contamination between his food - serving him lasagne or shepards pie is hilarious...but thats another story!). I made this the other night and got it out to cut up last night and have the mandatory nibble and taste test (required of all new recipes!) and it was brilliant, the honey was sweet without being too sweet and so much nicer then using the marshmallows.

Here is the recipe as adapted by me but you could add 1 cup of coconut with the rice bubbles if you wanted:

Honey Rice Bubble Slice

Ingredients:
2tbspns honey
75g butter
1/2c caster sugar
4 cups rice bubbles

Melt honey, butter and sugar in a small pan on the stove top. Bring to the boil, but keep stirring.
Working quickly, pour over rice bubbles and combine.
Press into a lined 18cm x 28cm slice tin
Refrigerate overnight or until firm - should be ok after 1/2 hour.

And last but certainly not least and it's another day with another batch of cupcakes....today I received 2 donations for the RSPCA plus some guys I work with, who only this morning listened to me complain about not having enough containers to transport large numbers of cupcakes, made me two stainless steel trays with high sides that should fit 24 cupcakes each - so I made them some cupcakes as well as a thank you because the trays will just make my life so much easier. Anyway given I had so many cupcakes to make (4 batches in total!) I decided on a simple decoration, I made some basic chocolate cupcakes and then frosted them with Betty Crocker's Deluxe Chocolate Frosting. I also found these little tiny Oreo cookies at the supermarket so I topped the frosting with one of those and they are just adorable, simple, but still adorable!

Tomorrow....Happy Friday!

Em x

2 comments:

  1. Risotto was the very first thing I learned how to cook. I was 13 and found a recipe on the bottom of a cream cheese packet!!
    I have had a LOT of time to perfect it since then.

    Those cakes look FABULOUS!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks Jess! Made my day when I saw someone was actually reading my rambling! I'm not sure why I was so worried about risotto, it just had a bad reputation I think!

    ReplyDelete

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