Nailing it, for now
Last night I think I nailed a recipe I’ve been tinkering with since I did it on a PBS cooking show several years ago. That’s a whole story in itself for another time. It’s seafood risotto and there’s a few tweaks that make the difference between good and great.
Rinse the rice to the level of purity you would sushi rice. This keeps it clean and crisp at the finish. Blend chicken and clam juice for the broth and be sure to cook the whole mixture down before adding more broth. Start with garlic and onion browned almost to the point of crisping at which point you want to flash it with the least expensive Sauvignon Blanc you can find, like a 2-buck Chuck. Make sure you slowly simmer the calamari in the wine for the full 45 minutes. Impatience is no virtue here. Season gently with pasta sauce, parsley, pepper, and a bay leaf.
Using simply baby (for sure) calamari and (fresh or canned) chopped clams, this turns out to be a perfect, light spring risotto. Perfect in the most impermanent sense, until it suggests a different version of perfection later this month …
May 2nd, 2005 17:00
I didn’t know you took such interest in cooking. Sounds great though.
May 3rd, 2005 06:44
Indeed. Cooking is total practice of paying attention and respecting the value of every ingredient, working only with what you have. It’s all about transformation on all levels - alchemy that no life should be without.