The Daring Cooks' March 2010 Challenge-Comfort Food from the Heart

The 2010 March Daring Cooks challenge was hosted by Eleanor of MelbournefoodGeek and Jess of Jessthebaker. They chose to challenge Daring Cooks to make risotto. The various components of their challenge recipe are based on input from the Australian Masterchef cookbook and the cookbook Moorish by Greg Malouf.

Hello fellow daring cooks! Doesn't it seem just like a few days ago that we posted our mezzes? Well technically it was a few days ago--tee hee! And now it's time to show what we've done with the March challenge which is yummy risotto. Rice has always been close to the Filipino, some of us eat rice three times a day, breakfast, lunch and dinner! So it's not a surprise to find a lot of rice-based recipes here.

I chose to combine east and west in my risotto recipe by making it into BRINGHE which is traditionally made with white rice and glutinous rice. The texture of the risotto is perfect for this dish. After making the risotto base. I added turmeric and coconut milk to the remaining stock. I used patis (fish sauce) in seasoning my risotto to make it taste more like bringhe. I sauteed diced red bell peppers, chicken fillet pieces, diced pork and small shrimps and topped my bringhe with it. I boiled eggs to decorate my plate after.

I still have some leftover Carnaroli risotto rice in my pantry and I am thinking of other variations I can try with it.

The risotto was colored with turmeric and cooked further in coconut milk

Chicken Stock
Ingredients:

1 large chicken 2-3 pounds about 1 kg

chicken bones 2-3 pounds 1 kg

2 onions, roughly diced

1 medium leek - white part only, roughly diced

2 sticks celery, roughly diced

2 cloves garlic, halved

1 cinnamon stick

1 tsp. white peppercorns ( Any type of whole peppercorn will do)

2 bay leaves (fresh or dried, it doesn't matter.)

peel of 1/2 lemon

1/4 tsp. allspice

Directions:
Wash the chicken and bones and places in a 5 Litre pot, cover completely with water and bring to a boil
Skim away any scum as it comes to the surface
Add the vegetables and bring back to a boil
Add the rest remaining ingredients and simmer very gently, uncovered for 1.5 hours
Carefully lift out the chicken, set aside. The chicken meat can be removed from the chicken, shredded off and used for other things like soup!
Simmer the stock gently for another hour. At , at the end you should have around 2 Liters
Carefully ladle the liquid into a fine sieve, the less the bones and vegetables are disturbed in this process the clearer the stock will be. 
The stock is now ready for use. Freeze what you don't need for later use.

Risotto Base
Ingredients:

olive oil 2 fluid oz 60 ml

1 small onion, quatered

rice 14 oz 400g Any type of risotto rice will do. I use Arborio but the recipe itself says Vialone Nano. Another to look for is Carnaroli.

white wine 2 fl oz 60 ml

chicken or vegetable stock , simmering 2 pints 1 L

Directions:
Heat oil in a pan and add onion. Fry for a few minutes to flavour the oil then discard. (We diced ours and left it in as we like onion).
Add the rice and stir for a few minutes to coat each grain of rice with oil and toast slightly.
Add the wine and let it bubble away until evaporated.
Add enough stock to cover the rice by a finger’s width (about an inch or two). Don't actually stick your finger in, it will be hot. Just eye it off.
Cook on medium heat, stirring with a wooden spoon from time to time, until most of the stock has been absorbed.
Repeat Step 5 making sure to leave aside approximately 100 ml. of stock for the final step. .
Repeat, save 100ml for the final stage.
Once you are at this point, the base is made. You now get to add your own variation

Thank you Eleanor of MelbournefoodGeek and Jess of Jessthebaker for this month's challege!