Post 210: Butternut Squash and Chorizo Risotto mk II

I've made this before and it was declared a roaring success. So, I had all requisite ingredients I approached with confidence and without recourse to googling "Simple risotto recipes".

Recipe:
1) Taking my Butternut squash, I halved and de-seeded it. Then fairly roughly chopped 2 massive garlic cloves added some salt, pepper and olive oil and popped it in a medium oven for an hour.

2) Made 2 pints of stock, and left this ready warming on a low light.

3) I then finely chopped an onion and starting that softening in olive oil along with just a little more garlic. Vampires are very prevalent at this time of year and you just cannot afford to take any chances.

4) Then in with the chorizo (half a ring, chopped into 1/2" lumps, this much rice could have done with a whole ring really). Once this had started to lose a little of it's lovely spicy oil, in with the rice (300gs) and a good stir to coat it all. Followed by a good pour of white wine. Then another pour of white wine for me.

5) With the mix on a low-ish light, stirring all the time, I added stock little by little each time it it looked in any danger of starting to stick to the bottom.

6) Here's the bit not to repeat. I decided I wanted the squash to disintegrate through the risotto, rather than just be big occasional lumps - so I put it in with the rice only part cooked. Mistake. From then when I added stock, it was soaked up by the squash rather than the rice. Eventually I had to pour all the stock in and the rice re-started to absorb some liquid. This all took much longer than it would have, and left me with a mix just the wrong side of sloppy.

7) Once the rice had finally cooked. I partly remedied by grating all the parmesan I had - half a block. Stirring that in, it finally approached some sort of proper risotto consistency. The extra parmesan made it super cheesy; which worked for me.

Here it is, still a nice meal and a lesson on risotto cooking learned, but not quite as good as my first effort ->(http://vegboxboy.blogspot.com/2010/03/post-183-roasted-butternut-squash.html)

Oh, and I've just remembered the wine recommendation: an Australian oaked Chardonnay or probably more to my tastes a Fleuire or Morgan Beaujolais. Sounds nice, but I was being good and just had water; boring.