Baked Mac-and-Cheese, However Make It Rice

Risotto is just not precisely a make-ahead meals. Sure, you’ll be able to par-cook the rice, or velocity up the method with a stress cooker, however finally it is a dish that must be completed proper earlier than serving. However once I was engaged on my arancini (rice balls) recipe, it occurred to me that there may simply be a manner to make use of the identical classes I would realized from the arancini and apply them to a make-ahead risotto recipe.

The problem with arancini is ensuring they arrive out moist and juicy. Most recipes have you ever begin by cooking a risotto, then chilling it and forming it into balls, and at last deep frying them. The issue is that risotto, as soon as cooked and cooled, doesn’t develop into moist once more when reheated until further liquid is stirred in to loosen it up.

My answer with the arancini was to take a trick from croquette recipes by folding a bechamel-like combination into the cooked rice: bechamel, when reheated, liquifies greater than risotto alone will. It labored fantastically, creating arancini with crisp deep-fried exteriors and flavorful rice facilities that circulation while you chunk into them.

As I used to be frying my take a look at batches of rice balls, I spotted that what I had really created was a make-ahead risotto: one which melts and softens when reheated. And since forming and deep-frying rice balls is admittedly a bit little bit of a ache within the butt, I questioned why, if pressed for time, I could not simply load the rice filling right into a baking dish after which end it within the oven, multi function shot.

To check it out, I folded some diced mozzarella into the chilled rice combination, then spooned it right into a baking dish and topped it with a easy crispy topping of panko bread crumbs combined with parmesan cheese and a few melted butter.

As a result of I had discovered that sushi rice labored greatest for the arancini, I additionally used it right here (risotto rice had a bent to blow out a bit). However you can additionally make this work with risotto rice like carnaroli or vialone nano.

The outcomes had been scrumptious. Similar to a baked pasta, it is a bit thicker than its à la minute counterpart, and is deeply satisfying in that rib-sticking winter meals type of manner. In essence, that is the risotto equal of a baked mac and cheese.

The wonder is that you would be able to make the entire thing nicely prematurely, preserve it refrigerated, after which pop it within the oven till heated by means of and browned on high. My recipe right here makes use of the identical Milanese-style saffron taste as my arancini, however there isn’t any motive you could not make this primary thought work with any risotto taste.

I will nonetheless make deep-fried rice balls occasionally, however I’ve a sense this make-and-bake methodology could get much more play at my place, particularly once I’m entertaining.

November 2014