Chicken, spinach and cauliflower risotto with melting fontina
This is a bit like the Sunday lunch I used to enjoy as a child – roast chicken, cauliflower cheese and greens – but all mixed together in a soft bowlful. If you can’t find fontina, use Gruyère instead. It’s different – it doesn’t melt in the same way and fontina is richer – but it’s not a bad substitute.
Ingrediënten
- ½ tbsp olive oil
- 10 g ¼oz unsalted butter
- 1 small onion finely chopped
- 600 ml 1 pint chicken stock
- 150 g 5½oz risotto rice
- 50 ml 2fl oz dry white wine or dry vermouth
- ½ medium cauliflower broken into florets
- 75 g 2¾oz spinach leaves, washed, coarse stems removed
- 100 g 3½oz cooked chicken, torn into pieces
- freshly grated nutmeg
- 45 g 1¾oz fontina cheese, coarsely grated
- salt and pepper
- grated Parmesan to serve (optional)
Instructies
- Heat the olive oil and butter in a heavy-based saucepan and gently sauté the onion until it is soft but not coloured.
- Heat the chicken stock separately, so it is gently simmering.
- Add the rice to the onion and stir it around in the butter.
- Cook for a couple of minutes over a medium heat, then add the wine or vermouth.
- Let this bubble until it has almost disappeared, stirring all the time.
- Now add the stock, a ladleful at a time, again stirring the rice constantly.
- Only add a new ladleful of stock when the previous one has been absorbed.
- It will take about 25 minutes for the rice to cook; it should end up soft but with a little bite still in the centre of each grain.
- Before the cooking time is up – when there’s about 10 minutes left – boil or microwave the cauliflower (I microwave both cauliflower and broccoli, I think it’s a great method for them) until only just tender.
- Add this to the risotto and keep stirring, being careful not to crush the cauliflower.
- When there are about three minutes left to go, add the spinach, chicken and nutmeg.
- Stir in the cheese right at the end (it will melt in the heat) and add salt and pepper to taste (you probably won’t need much salt as reduced stock makes risotto salty).
- Serve immediately.
- You can offer some grated Parmesan on the side if you want, but it is pretty strong already.
