Lola’s Kitchen: Risotto Recipe

Posted January 23, 2015 by Lola in Lola's Kitchen / 28 Comments

LolaKitchen

Lola’s Kitchen is a feature on Lola’s Reviews where I talk about all things related to food, cooking and baking. These posts can be recipe posts or more discussion type posts about food. I love cooking and spend some time in the kitchen almost every day, so I wanted to give it a place on my blog as well. The banner for this feature is designed by Michelle from Limabean Design.

I’ll be sharing my recipe for risotto with you today. I love risotto as it’s easy and simple to make and I usually make in tuesdays when I have cleand the rat cage and don’t want to stand in the kitchen for too long. While risotto is simple, you can think of endless variation and I like experimenting with different ingredients and vegetables in my risotto, but the basic is always the same. I am not sure were the original recipe ever originated from, I only know that I currently make risotto without a recipe. So here’s my recipe for risotto!
Risotto

Ingredients

Risotto ingredients

  • Risotto Rice/ arborio rice – 200 gram/ 1 cup
  • Warm Water – one liter/ 4 cups
  • 2 Bouillon Cubes (I always use vegetable bouillon cubes, but other flavour should work fine too)
  • 1 onion
  • Vegetables of your choice
  • A few tablespoons olive oil
  • Any spices of your choice (optional)
  • Cheese (optional)
  • One saucepan or wok

I like to throw in some spices to complement the veggies I am using and I prefer my risotto without cheese. I also add in a bit more water sometimes, especially when cooking my vegetables in the pan as well. This recipe feeds about 3 people. The pictures used in thsi recipe were of a time I made Traffic Light Risotto with paprika, carrots and green beans, see variation tip at the bottom of this post.

Method

  1. Slice and dice the onion and the vegetables of your choice
  2. Heat the oil in the wok or saucepan. When the oil is warm, throw in the onion and bake the onion until it’s a bit translucent.
  3. Throw in the risotto rice. Any raw vegetables you’re using should be put into the suacepan as well. Mix the bouillon cubes in the water and throw a bit into the saucepan. Let the rice soak up some of the water and then throw in a bit more water. Repeat this step until all the water is gone. This can take about 20 till 30 minutes.
  4. Your risotto is ready to eat! Enjoy

Pictures

For these pictures I made my Traffic Light Risotto (see variation tips below).

First step throw in the onion:

onion in wok

All the ingredients in the wok:

food in wok

Add the water:
risotto in progress

Variation tips

I love experimenting with risotto and often try a new variation every few weeks. My last new one was curry spices ketchup risotto. Here are some of the risotto variations I tried and enjoyed

  • Indian Curry beans risotto. Use the following vegetables: green beans, peas and string beans. Add the following spices: turmeric, garam masala, madras, cinnamon, clove, cardamom and savory
  • Risotto with pumpkin and apples. Slice and dice the pumpkin and apples, mix it with some pumpkin spices and cinnamon. Then put it in the oven for about 20 minutes and then throw them in the risotto. Inspired by The Cozy Apron
  • Traffic Light Risotto. Add 2 red paprika’s, green beans and carrots to the risotto. I also added one teaspoon mild madras and two tablespoons paprika powder for extra taste.
  • Risotto with corn and apples. Slice and dice some carrots and cook them with the risotto. Slice, dice and peel 3 apples, warm the apples in the oven for about 15-20 minutes on 180 degrees celcius/ 350 degrees fahrenheit before throwing them in once the risotto is done. Throw in some corn. I also like to add some cinnamon. See picture below.

    • Risotto with apples and corn

Do you like Risotto and which vegetables and spices do you prefer to thrown in?

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28 responses to “Lola’s Kitchen: Risotto Recipe”

    • Lola

      I hope you’ll give it a try! I really like risotto and it’s fun to experiment with different variations. I recently figured out you could throw egg in as well, yum!

      Reply
    • Lola

      I am not a big fan of bland rice, but as risotto or fried rice I love it. The pumpkin and apples risotto is so good! Although I make the apples and corn variation more often as it takes less time to prepare. I hate slice and dicing pumpkins.

      Reply
    • Lola

      I am not a big fan of seafood or mushrooms, so I don’t cook with those ingredients a lot, but it certainly sounds like a good idea if you like those things. I liek hwo many different variations of risotto you can make and how it all tastes to different.

      Reply
    • Lola

      Thanks Jeann! These are both simple and delicious recipes, I have quite some more easy recipes coming up and a few more difficult ones. Let me know if you try any of my recipes out, would love to hear how it turns out!

      Reply
    • Lola

      I live in the Netherlands and we always use grams and liters here, so if I already have to convert everythgin for myself, might as well put them in the post as well. And I know how frustrating it is to stand in the kitchen and realize you still have to convert the measurements first, so I thought I would spare everyone the effort and include both measurements. Only with teaspoons and tablespoons I always just use teaspoons myself as I don’t weigh my spices.

      Reply
    • Lola

      Here they usually sell it as risotto rice, it is a very different kind of rice. It’s shorter and thicker and it absorbs lots of water, that’s why you have to let it cook with so much bouillon. I assumed in other countries it’s called risotto rice as well, but I am not 100% sure.

      I hope you give it a try! I think risotto is really yummy and you can add whatever you want to the rice.

      Reply
    • Lola

      I am a big fan of risotto and usualy make it at leats once a week, but a different variation every week. I think Michelle mentioned it was called arborio rice over there? It’s a bit shorter and thicker rice that absorbs a lot of water. It is noticeable different from normal rice, the structure is very different. Here it’s just called risotto rice, I am afraid I am going to make a few more translation mistakes like that in future posts.

      Reply
    • Lola

      I hope you give the curry risotto a try! It was so fun to combine my love for risotto and curries and my boyfriend really liked the curry variation. I made the apple and corn variation this week as we had some leftover apples, yum!

      Reply
    • Lola

      I love making risotto, it’s so easy and delicious. Nowadays I make it every tuesday as after cleaning the rat cage I usually don’t have the energy to stand in the kitchen for long.

      Reply

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