Miso Risotto

This is a recipe I concocted in an attempt to create fusion food. I'd been wanting to try making a mushroom risotto but thought of using shitake mushrooms. Seeing how shitake mushrooms aren't exactly Italian fare, I thought why not go one step further and use miso soup as a base instead of vegetable stock?

Ingredients

1 leek, halved lengthwise and sliced.
35g dried shitake mushrooms, sliced (see note below)
100g enoki mushrooms, ends cut off and clumps separated
400g fish fillets, sliced thickly (approx 1 inch thick)
1 handful dried seaweed
7 tablespoons japanese soyabean paste
6 cups water
1 cup arborio rice

Method:

1. In a saucepan, add the soyabean paste to the water and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat once the mixture has boiled.
   
2. Add the dried seaweed into the hot soup.
   
3. In pot, stirfry the leek with olive oil until softened.
4. Add the arborio rice and stir until the rice is mostly translucent.
   
5. Add a ladleful of the soup into the pot of rice and stir in until most of the liquid is absorbed.
6. Repeat the above until the rice has softened but still has a bite to it.
   
7. Add the mushrooms and fish into the pot, and another ladleful of the soup. Cook until the soup has been absorbed and the fish has been cooked through.
   

Tips:

Soak the dried shitake mushrooms in hot water for about ten minutes (or until it softens) before slicing it. You may use fresh shitake mushrooms - I just prefer the dried ones.

The brown soyabean paste is available from most Asian shops - it is made of soyabeans, salt and sometimes kelp or a bit of seafood. It is also the main ingredient for miso soup, so you might want to look for something labelled miso paste if you're unsure. If you cannot find the soyabean paste, you might consider using instant miso soup packets to make up the stock, but it is much cheaper to buy the soyabean paste.

I purposely made the soup quite strong tasting as I wanted the miso to be the base flavour of the risotto. If you're not a big fan of miso soup, you could reduce the amount of soyabean paste used by 1-2 tablespoons.

You could also consider using field mushrooms, or oyster mushrooms as well. Just make sure that the mushroom you choose is not particularly strong tasting because otherwise it might counteract the taste of the miso base.

Experimental Seafood Risotto

The original recipe was for a roasted pumpkin and spinach risotto from Superfood Ideas. I tweaked it so that I could have a tomato based seafood risotto. The measurements have not been perfected yet, so please take these measurements as a rough guide until I ascertain accurate amounts.

This recipe will serve between 4-6 people.

Ingredients:

Seafood mixture:

3-4 cloves of garlic, crushed or minced.
dried herbs (I used oregano and thyme)
300-400g fish fillets, chunky slices (approx 2cm thick)
desired amount of other seafood items
*eg: prawns, shelled but with tail still on
crabsticks, sliced

Others:

1 leek, sliced thinly
1 can (approx 400g) whole peeled tomatos
1 and a 1/2 tablespoons powdered vegetable stock
1 and a 1/2 cups arborio rice
50g mushrooms, sliced
100g baby spinach or spinach with most of the stems removed
20g butter
1/2 cup parmesan cheese

Method:

1. Place the seafood in a bowl and mix in crushed garlic and dried herbs. Season with a little pepper and set aside.
   
2. Open the can of whole tomatos and use a knife to break up the whole pieces in the can.
3. Pour the contents into a measuring cup and top up with water. Make sure you end up with approximately 7 cups of water. Transfer into a pot and add the vegetable stock.
4. Bring the tomato based liquid to a boil, then reduce to a simmer.
5. In another pan (B), add some olive oil and fry the leeks until softened.
6. Add the arborio rice to (B) and stir until the rice grains are mostly translucent.
   
7. Pour in a ladleful of stock and stir on medium heat until most of the liquid has been absorbed by the rice. Repeat with remaining stock until rice is mostly tender, but still firm to the bite.
   
8. Stir in mushroom, spinach and seafood mix. Cover and set aside until the spinach is wilted and the seasfood is cook.
   
9. Stir in butter and parmesan cheese. Serve.

Tips:

It is important to stir as the liquid tends to stay at the top, thus the rice will get burnt and will stick to the pan.

Reserve your largest pot for the risotto - you need as much space as possible in order to effectively stir in all the ingredients.

Try experimenting with other veggies. Note that some veggies may need to be put in earlier. Leafy vegetables like spinach will cook quickly, whereas you might want to give capsicum a longer time to cook through.

For my first trial run, I used Basa fillets and I achieved fantastic results - the fish was very soft and took on some of the flavours of the risotto. You might want to consider a fish with a mild, if any, flavour as it goes better with the tomato based stock. If you want to use salmon, I'd suggest using a non tomato based stock.

Ridiculously Simple Coconut Ice

This recipe does not require any cooking whatsoever, but requires a setting time of at least one and a half hours.

Ingredients:

250g icing sugar
175g dessicated coconut
150ml condensed milk
Food colouring

Method:

1. Dust a pan with some icing sugar.
   
2. Sieve the icing sugar into a bowl.
3. Mix in the condensed milk and dessicated coconut and stir through until the mixture becomes stiff.
   
4. Divide the mixture into two portions.
5. Add food colouring if required.
   
6. Press down and evenly distribute one portion of the mixture into the dusted pan.
   
7. Press down and evenly distribute the second portion of the mixture into the filled pan.
8. Leave to set in a cool area.
9. Cut the coconut ice into cubes or bars with an oiled knife.
   

Tips:

Wrap the coconut ice in greaseproof paper, or use greaseproof paper layers and store in an air tight container.

You might want to try adding some flavouring to your coconut ice - I know a lady who makes peppermint coconut ice!