A Delicious Tomato Risotto

In my teens I became hooked on cheese toasties. For months I'd eat nothing else. Then one night, without warning, the rush was gone, vanished without trace. I wouldn't give up without a fight though and started experimenting with the addition of 'exotics'.

Sometimes it worked... black pepper, sometimes it really didn't... cloves. One night, from the back of my parents spice cupboard, where every spice is still out of date, I pulled a jar of dried basil. Wow, what a revelation.

This combination so impressed my juvenile palette, I risked introducing it to my first proper-ish girlfriend. She was smitten. Not on me though. Months later I found myself opposite her new boyfriend in a bar, above the general hullabaloo all I could hear was, "Cheese toasties... bla bla...basil... bla bla... amazing". A silent rage began to swell, luckily I was just sober enough to hold back shouting across, "That's my recipe you bastard!".

Nowadays I know it's not really a surprise these ingredients mix so well. Pesto after all is mostly cheese and basil. Of course what basil's really famous for going with is tomato, so here's a dish other than pizza that sees them work so well together.

Tomato Risotto

Aside from butter, olive oil and hot stock, this is all you'll need.

The two cheeses are Parmesan and Tomme de Savoie. The tomato sauce is made by liquidising a tin of tomatoes then pushing them through a sieve with the back of a spoon. It's an adaptation of a recipe from the book 'Dear Franscesca' by Mary Contini. Follow the usual risotto recipe: like this one here , but omit the pancetta: and add the tomato sauce just after the white wine but before you start adding the hot stock. I used a low salt vegetable stock cube and it worked a treat.

Both cheeses go in at the end, let them melt then pop in the shredded basil. The original recipe used Fontina cheese but when I asked for some in Mellis's great cheese shop they told me they hadn't stocked it since 2000 !! The guy behind the counter explained it was because while it tastes great eaten in situ in the Valle d'Aosta they hadn't found one that travelled well. Strewth, a cheese that makes you come to it. How demanding. Instead he recommended Tomme de Savoie which worked perfectly, lots of melted, stringy cheesy goodness.

Tomatoes are a notoriously difficult wine match. But in this dish the tomato flavour is tempered by the cheese and basil and this wine worked well. It's on offer just now and an absolute steal for the rather odd price of £5.24. Full of delicious pink grapefruit flavours.

Forte Alto Pinot Grigio, Dolomiti, 2010. Down from £7.99 to £5.24 in Waitrose. What a bargain.

Chanterelle Risotto

Apologies for not posting this sooner. It wasn't poisoning, just a bad dose of work, the curse of the blogging classes. These are all the ingredients other than chanterelles and Parmesan. And this is what I did.

Sauteed the chanterelles in a bit of butter and garlic over a fast heat for a couple of minutes and set aside. I reckon there was nearly a kilo. It's a big frying pan.

Next sautee a finely chopped shallot very gently with pancetta cubes in some butter and olive oil for 10 minutes without colouring the shallot.

Add the risotto rice, 300 g for 4 servings, and gently fry for a couple of minutes until the rice starts turning transparent. Add half a glass of white wine and keep stirring till it's all absorbed. Do the same with a ladle of hot stock and then keep repeating the process with hot stock until the rice is done.

I like it to retain a good bite. A couple of minutes before it's done stir in the chanterelles and their juices. Finally add some finely chopped parsley, Parmesan, a knob of butter then stick the lid on and leave it stand for 5 minutes.

I tasted for seasoning then had one of my 'ideas'. These can go either way, normally the wrong way.

Thankfully this one was right. A tablespoon of white balsamic vinegar over each portion. It added a gentle fruity acidity that cut through the richness and really complimented the chanterelles. The quantity of chanterlles made for a magical, enveloping scent. Apricoty yes, but so much more besides. It was ethereal. I would say that, but there was a witness, honest.

My plan to serve a viognier (apricot flavour like chanterelles) also went awry when I spotted this reduced in Tesco.

Bargain. And boy was it good. It went pretty well too. Lots of nougat on the the nose and palate and nice acidity too.

In a slight aside I've started realising that certain wines suit certain music. I'll develop that idea in later blogs, but for now, might I suggest a Mirwais 2000 to listen to while drinking Meursault. Not just because he's French with a similar name. It's a perfect combination. How could one listen to anything else while supping Meursault?