Spinach Risotto with Scamorza Cheese.

Spinach and Scamorza Risotto is one of the classical ones. 
Scamorza adds it's nice smoked flavour to the dish. What kind of cheese Scamorza is? The origin of this cheese is Southern Italy. It's similar to Mozzarella but it is aged more. Scamorza has a particular shape of a pear: while producing it they generally form the cheese in round shape and then tear one third of it to tie a string around it in order to dry the cheese. This is how it gets it's pear-like shape. Scamorza can be plain or smoked and for this recipe you need the smoked one...



INGREDIENTS: 
Servings: 2

160-180g rice
150-200g spinach
125g smoked Scamorza cheese
50ml white wine
1/4 onion
1 garlic clove
1 handful grated Parmigiano
~1 veg. stock cube
3-4 tbs EVO oil
1tbs butter

1. Chop onion finely and cut garlic clove into halves.
2. Pour some EVO oil in a sauce pan and simmer the onion and garlic till the onion gets transparent. Discard garlic after browning.

 3. Add rice to the pan and stir, the rice will absorb the condiment and become partly transparent.
Note: Never wash rice for risotto!!!
4. Pour a splash of white wine and stir, wait till the wine looses the alcohol.

5. Add 150ml hot water and half a vegetable stock to the rice. Stir well and keep cooking at a low heat.
Note: You can always use your home-made vegetable broth is you have any. I suggest the stock cube for those who don't have much time to prepare the broth...
6. When the rice gets dry add 100ml of hot water. 

7. Meanwhile, wash and chop the spinach into thin squares or stripes.
8. When the rice is almost ready (after about 15 minutes) add the chopped spinach. Always check if the rice needs more water.
Note: Why don't we put all the water (broth) straightaway? By adding the water little by little, risotto will result in being creamier!!!   

9. After about 5 minutes risotto will be ready, so you will switch the heat off and add Scamorza cheese that you cubed finely. 

10. Add one handful of grated parmigiano cheese and some butter to season your risotto.
   

Buon Appetito!!!

Asparagus Risotto

Delicate and creamy Asparagus Risotto has a nice light green colour that recalls your senses to the fresh and soft meadows, spring breeze and sunshine. 
Asparagus is rich in Vitamins A, B and C and has a slight diuretic effect. This is what we need to prepare for summer and loose some weight eating delicious but light dishes.  


INGREDIENTS:
Servings: 2

250g asparagus
160g rice 
1/2 small onion
50ml of white wine
1 carrot
1 celery stalk
Parmigiano cheese
50g butter / EVO oil  

1. Peel the asparagus: using the vegetable peeler, peel the lower half of the spears, the hard part till the part that starts being flexible if you bend the asparagus.
2. Cut the upper 1/3 of the asparagus.

3. Cover the lower part of the asparagus with water just enough to cover it. Keet the asparagus tips aside.
4. Cook the asparagus for about 7-8 minutes, then add the asparagus tips and cook for 3-5 minutes more.
5. Drain the asparagus and keep the water.
6. Cut the peeled carrot and celery stalk into small parts and boil with the asparagus water for 10  
 minutes. This is how we prepare the vegetable broth that we'll use for risotto.

7. Chop the onion finely and simmer it with some butter till the onion gets transparent at a low heat.
Note: You may use the EVO oil if you are allergic or intollerant to butter... 
8. Add unwashed rise to the onion and stir well till rice gets transparent as well as the onion.
Note: Never wash rice for Italian Risotto!!!
    
9. Splash some white wine to the rice and keep cooking at a low heat till the wine looses it's particular smell.
10. Simmer your risotto adding half a glass of the veg. broth when it gets too dry and keep stirring. Cook for about 18 minutes (depends on a type of rice you use)

11. Puree the lower parts of asparagus with a blender.


 

12. Cut the upper parts of asparagus spears in halves and keep the very tips for decoration, cut the rest into thin disks. 

13. Add the asparagus puree and chopped asparagus to risotto and salt it with a couple of pinches of salt, try if it's enough. 
14. Stir well and cook for 3 more minutes.

15. Switch off the heat and add handful of grated Parmigiano cheese.


16. Decorate risotto with the asparagus tips and serve with some extra grated Parmigiano to your liking.

   ENJOY !!! Buon Appetito!!!

 

Eggplant Parmigiana

The main ingredient of this dish may mislead to an idea that it is dietetic, but it's quite caloric as the eggplants are fried before cooking the dish. Though it's really delicious!!!
The name comes from the use of Parmigiano cheese in the recipe. Sometimes you can find varieties of Parmigiana, prepared with zucchini or other vegetables, but the original one is prepared with eggplants. 
  
INGREDIENTS: 
Servings: 4

800g (or so) eggplants
3-4 large slices of ham
250g Mozzarella cheese
100g Parmigiano cheese
500ml tomato purèe
1/2 onion
1/2 stalk of celery
1 carrot
salt
sugar
EVO oil  
 

1. Slice eggplants 1cm thin or a bit less, salt every slice and put them into a colander. Place a saucepan full of water on the eggplants in order to press them.
2. After half an hour remove the eggplant slices. They may become a bit darker in colour and moister as they release their juice. 
 
3. Fry the eggplants with the EVO oil and let them cool down. I usually use a non-stick pan to avoid having the eggplants too oily, I add just a bit of oil.

4. While the eggplants are cooling we'll cook a tomato sauce. This is a typical simple tomato sauce that you can use for pasta as well.
Chop onion and celery finely, grate carrot and cook it with some EVO oil till the mix becomes gold.

5. Add tomato purèe, couple of pinches of sugar and half a vegetable stock cube.  Dilute with some water (100ml or so).
6. Simmer the sauce till it becomes dense, try if it's salty enough. 

Note: Tomato sauce for this dish should be a bit drier. If it's too liquid, the dish will result in being watery as the dish also contains mozzarella cheese and this type of cheese has a lot of liquid in it.

7. Take mozzarella cheese out of it's whey and squeeze the remaining whey out. This prevents the dish from being too watery.
Note: As a hint, you can use mozzarella that is used for pizza, it's drier and is sold without whey. But PLEASE don't take GRATED mozzarella. If you use this Italian cheese, I'd like to let you know, that it doesn't exist grated in Italy!!!
8. So, cut mozzarella into small cubes. Grate Parmigiano cheese.  
  

9. Let's start joining the ingredients. In a ceramic or glass pan pour some EVO oil and some tomato sauce and place the fried eggplants as the first layer, then comes the sauce, ham slices ripped in pieces, after that add a handful of Mozzarella and sprinkle everything generously with grated Parmigiano.
 
 10. Repeat the layers, add more Parmigiano on top to have a nice crust.
 


This is how Parmigiana layers look like from the side.

11. Cook your Parmigiana in the oven at 200C for about 30 minutes.
   

Note: This is an original recipe but to enrich the recipe you can also add to the dish sautèed mushrooms and sliced eggs on each layer.