Saturday Night Recipe

It's that time of the week again.

I wanted to keep my new recipe night on Fridays, but yesterday I had plans to try this Portuguese restaurant that Cookie and I have been wanting to try for months now. Braseiro is a quaint, little restaurant on St-Laurent in the Villeray/Parc-X area. They boast the best chicken in town, so that's what the four of us got. I NEVER get chicken when I go out to a restaurant - unless it's in a wrap of some sort, but it was delicious! It's made on the grill, so it taste like BBQ chicken, which just brought me back to summer evenings in my parent's backyard. The only downside was that we didn't think of making reservations and had to sit at the bar. Oh well, no biggy and now we know.

So I tried my new recipe last night. I hadn't given it much thought during the day, because I was busy with an ad adaptation assignment. By the time I started thinking of what I could make, it was 5:30 and I was starving and in no mood to go to the grocery store (it's been really cold lately and I've really been putting off).

I thought we had squid ink left over, and I thought I could try some squid ink risotto. So after rummaging through the pantry, I realized that The Boy must have thrown it away. I was scrambling around the kitchen, trying to figure out what I could make. And then I found the saffron. Saffron risotto doesn't sound as elegant (or digusting, depending) as squid ink risotto, but I never made risotto at all. I had to substitute the white wine for red and at first I thought it would ruin it, and I had to use the fake parmesan cheese, but all in all, it turned out pretty well.

It's actually pretty simple to make, it just needs your constant attention because you need to pour in the chicken stock about 1/2 cup at a time, wait for it to absorb and add more stock. Don't, say, write a blog post while you're making it - that's a bad idea.

It's best to get rice that's especially for risotto - I had Arborio. Chop up some onions, add them to pan with oil. When the onions are transparent, add the a cup of rice and a cup of white wine. When the wine's gone, you're supposed to add boiling chicken stock, but I didn't bother boiling it. When the stock is all absorbed, mix in some butter and parmesan. Remove from heat and cover for about 2 minutes. Mmm, mmm good.

Now I definitely want to try making squind ink risotto - and if I can find a good recipe - some barley risotto.  

As soon as it warms up, I'll make getting supper more of a priority.