Prawn Risotto

I really enjoy risotto. It’s a fairly simple dish to make and just super tasty! One Saturday afternoon I decided I would try my luck with a prawn and courgette risotto. I’d made it a few times before and thought I’d use this opportunity to work on my timing, just in terms of how quickly I could get a risotto ready for dinner, if I had most of the prep work done.

I peeled about 12 decent sized prawns and had those clean and read to go. Then I diced up an onion, and also a couple of cloves or garlic and a medium sized red chilli (I’m not that brave so most of the seeds didn’t make their way into the meal. So first step I put the diced onion into a pot with a pour of olive oil, you basically want the onion to soften and go all glossy looking.

Then I added a cup(and a bit) of Arborio rice. You want the rice to be coated in the oil. Once this is done add in a generous splash of white wine (nothing too sweet) and slowly simmer it away.

Next up add a litre of chicken stock. I’ve found with risotto that its about 1 litre of stock to 1 cup of rice. This is where I am lazy because I know you are probably meant to add the stock warm and in stages, but I pour it all on and once and just carefully monitor how its going while doing other things. Stirring often is important though to make sure it isn’t sticking.

So what other jobs do you need to work on for this dish – slicing up 2 or 3 courgettes (baby zucchinis). You then just need to quickly boil these in salty water and after a minute or so of boiling, rinse them in cold water to stop them from cooking further. So once this is done splash some olive oil into a pan, and throw in the garlic and chilli and just release the flavours, then add the prawns and it should only take a minute or so for them to cook through. Then take the pan away from the heat.

While you are waiting for the stock to fully absorb the last prep work required is grating some parmesan cheese and also lemon zest. To have it ready to mix through the rice mixture once its finished cooking. How much cheese you add is sort of a personal preference thing I suppose, but I’d say at least half a cup.

So the finally step is adding the cheese, lemon zest, courgettes and prawns (along with the oil and garlic and chilli from the pan) into the rice and mixing it thoroughly though. Really didn’t take too long to prepare and even with just over a cup of rice, it usually makes two meals for us. And it’s a dish that seems to age well. Give it a day in the fridge and it brings the flavours out more.

Would love to hear any other risotto recipes that you’ve made!