Risotto Primavera verde, ma verdissima!

The beauty of Italy is that everyone region and every person has their own story or version about a recipe…

Risotto is one of the most famous dishes of Northern Italy. Everyone thinks of Risotto alla Milanese if it is mentioned, and most of the time as a winter dish…

As spring has come around in Italy, we are enjoying much of the new fresh green bounty. After going to the vegetable stand I go to almost every day, I picked up the freshest peas, asparagus, herbs and green onions. I thought I’d try a new way of making risotto today.

 

Once home, I filled the pasta cooking pot with water and set it to boil (the one with the colander insert) and washed all my greens right away. As I started to shell the peas,  the shells were tossed into the pot. Same thing  with the stems of the green onions, the stems of the asparagus and also the stem of the herbs. Instead of tossing them in the garbage, I produced a large pot of water infused with the flavors of peas, green onions, asparagus and herbs to substitue the usual chicken or beef stock usually required to make a risotto. It just came to a boil, and I let it then simmer along, as I continued preparing the rest of my ingredients for the risotto. I had made on purpose much more than I needed of the infused water, but more about that later…

Then I set out to make a “Risotto in bianco” (white risotto) with the use of extra virgin olive oil instead of butter, the very fresh spring green onions instead of regular yellow onion.

Sliced the thin pencil asparagus sort of slanted lengthwise.

Then, I drained the greens from the infused water and started to make the risotto using Principato di LucedioCarnaroli rice from the 2007 harvest. Once the rice soaked up the olive oil and was toasted and cracking, poured some dry white wine. As the wine evaporated, started to add the wonderful infused water, which had made the house smell so green and as if you were in the vegetable garden of a farm house on top of the Tuscan hills–country aromatherapy for city dinning rooms!

Once the risotto was almost done, the chopped herbs and a few large ladleful of infused water and just let it sit for about 3 minutes before serving it. Plated the dish on soup bowl and did not serve with Parmigiano, but instead a drizzle of the wonderful Laudemio extra virgin olive oil, which enhanced the green and spring flavors of the risotto.

The rest of the infused water I saved in my empty mineral water bottles, and refrigerated until the next day, when I made spaghetti with asparagus, peas and pancetta. Instead of boiling the spaghetti in just plain water, I used the infused water to boil the pasta with the extra addition of salt. The pasta was so delicious, it was also yet another burst of spring in our mouths!

Fortunately, my dinner guests appreciated the risotto so much. My younger sister Estela and her husband Cristian were visiting along with our dear friends Anna and Luigi Federici who joined us for dinner at home.

We are still talking about the delicious flavor of that Risotto. I hope you can try it at home too. Buon appetito!

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