My family loves risotto and I make it round the year with seasonal produce. One of my favorite early summer risottos is pea and asparagus risotto. Currently my tomato plant is giving us a lot of cherry tomatoes and I am making the confit on repeat. Last week I added it to our risotto along with zucchini that is also from my garden. Nothing beat the freshness of fresh produce. Everything together, turned the risotto into a creamy light, with a hint of acidity from the tomatoes.
Ingredients for the Summer Risotto
Arborio RiceZucchini (I finely chopped some that I cooked along with the rice. And then grilled the zucchini ribbons to add on top as a garnish )LeekZucchini flowers. I added a few zucchini blossoms too, that I did a super quick grill on the pan before layering on top of the summer risotto as garnish.Cherry Tomatoes ( I used some left over tomato confit and few fresh cherry tomatoes that I grilled)Garlic, parmesan cheese, few fresh basil leaves
I seared the arborio rice using the oil for the tomato confit. If you don’t want to prepare the confit, then cook the risotto in oil and garlic. And at the end add the cherry tomatoes for the flavors to blend it.
Cooking the Risotto
Typically I prepare risotto with either vegetable or chicken stock. For this particular one, I use vegetable stock as I wanted the flavor of tomato confit to shine through. Arborio rice is the typical rice that is used to prepare risotto. It is short grain and quite starchy which give the creamy texture.
Substitute for Arborio Rice
If you cannot find arborio rice than you can substitute with other variety of short grain rice however you have to adjust by adding cream at the end.
Steps to prepare Summer Risotto with Tomato Confit and Zucchini:
Start by cooking the finely chopped leak (you can substitute with white onion) in sone oil and garlic. I use the tomato confit oil to start the cooking. Then add the arborio rice and toast it for a while. Add the chopped zucchini, and continue toasting for sometime. Finally start cooking the risotto using water water or stock at regular intervals until the rice it cooked. As the risotto cooks, simultaneously grill the zucchini ribbons (if using) zucchini flowers and few cherry tomatoes. Grilling these will barely take 5 to 7 minutes. At the end when the rice is almost cooked, add the tomatoes from the confit, parmesan cheese and few basil leaves. Layer the grilled veggies on top and serve it warm with more freshly grated parmesan cheese and more basil leaves. The confit adds a richness to the risotto along with a lovely acidity that goes so well with the creamy zucchini and the blossoms. I hope you will give this a try while we can still find these summer produce.
