Thursday, March 27, 2008

Risi e Bisi

That's really just a fancy name for Rice and Peas :) I like the Italian name - fun to say! This was my first risotto-style dish and it turned out really well - I had it with a salad for dinner last night. It was really quick and easy to make which is always appreciated! This is also a decent source of protein (almost 11g per serving) and is low-fat! Yeay :) The only bummer is the sodium content but if you use low-sodium broth and omit the salt/use unsalted butter, you can control that.

Serves 2 (as usual, the amounts are a bit funny since the original recipe was for 6!)

Ingredients:
2/3 tbsp. butter (I actually used the Earth Balance spread)
1/6 cup finely chopped yellow onion
1/4 cup short- or medium-grain rice
5/6 cup (just measure a little less than a cup...) reduced-sodium vegetable broth
2/3 cup water
Pinch of salt
Pinch of freshly-ground black pepper
Sprinkle of grated Parmesan cheese
2/3 tbsp. fresh parsley, chopped
1/8 tsp. dried oregano
1/8 tsp. dried basil
2/3 cup frozen green peas, thawed

Method:
1. Melt the butter in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add the onion to the pan and saute until golden.

2. Add the rice to the onion and saute 1 minute. Add the broth, water, salt, pepper, oregano, and basil. Bring the mixture to a boil.

3. Cover the pan and reduce the heat. Simmer for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the rice has absorbed most of the liquid. Stir in the peas, cheese, and parsley and let cook 2-3 minutes more.

Reference:
This recipe is from the January/February 2008 issue of Cooking Light magazine. The only changes I made were to add the oregano and basil. I also used the non-dairy spread in place of butter.

1 comment:

Saikat said...

Hi,
Saikat from BlogsJam here.
Wanted to email you, but could not locate your email address on the
blog. we have 2 cool widgets ( a slideshow widget and a content widget
) which can help enhance site interaction and reader's experience. pl contact me at saibose@gmail.com so that i can send you the slideshow widget for your blog.

thx-Saikat