The scent of rice cooking – whether it's a pilau flecked with pistachios, aporcini mushroom risotto or a rice pudding in a rectangular enamel dish,its skin black and puffed – brings this kitchen back to earth. Rice, cheap, nourishing and ever tohand, is an antidote to culinary flights of fancy or the occasionally elaborate dinner. The smell is homelyand, to this cook at least, thoroughly calming.
Stirring a risotto, especially when there is panic and mayhem around me, is one of the small pleasures of the kitchen, as is hearing the gentle rattle of a loose saucepan lidon apan of steaming basmati. And yet there is far too little rice eaten in this house – it is lagging way behind bread, potatoes and pasta in the starch stakes. I genuinely don't know why.
I made a risotto this week, a very basic version flavoured with grated parmesan and smoked pancetta cut into small pieces. It smelled like the inside of an Italian grocer's shop on a cool day.
There was a little left over which ended up, inevitably, in a bowl in thefridge. It had been a while sinceI had made arancini – the crisply coated balls of creamy rice that are the best use for yesterday's risotto I have yet found. So good were they that we made them again the following day, only this time from scratch.
My attempts at making arancini had been mixed till now. I had afew that fell apart and others that stayed cold inside. This time Imade smaller ones so the heat could travelright through to the centre but, more crucially, their smaller stature gave more of the crisp breadcrumb coating. A night in the fridge helped them to stay in one golfball-sized piece rather thanmelting into a rice puddle as they had done once before.
Having a dish of rice pudding left over is another thing. It is hard not to eat it as it is, thoroughly chilled from the fridge with a small amount of blackcurrant or fig jam in alittle mound in the centre.
But it could also end up as an ice cream. I did just that yesterday, folding whipped cream into the cool rice and adding a few stoned cherries into the bargain. (It could just as easily have been small ripe plums, stoned and cut into pieces, or blackberries.) Eaten the day it is made, this has quickly become one of my favourite ices, and an encouragement to get more rice on the stove.
Arancini
It is essential to chill the cooked rice reallyswiftly for this dish. Once the risotto is made, cool it quickly – if necessary by putting the pan into a sink full of cold water. Then chill it thoroughly in the fridge overnight.
onion 1, medium-sized
smoked pancetta 100g, in one piece
butter a thin slice
arborio rice 300g
chicken stock 600-700ml
parmesan 3 tbsp, grated
an egg beaten
Panko breadcrumbs 100g
lemon halves to serve
Directions
Peel the onion and chop it finely, then cut the pancetta into small dice. Melt the butter in a wide, shallow saucepan and add the pancetta cubes, then the onion. Leave it all to cook until the onion is soft but not coloured, stirring regularly so it doesn't brown.
Add the rice, stir to coat the grains in butter and pancetta fat, then pour in the chicken stock, one ladleful at a time, stirring almost continuously. You will find that the rice will take about 20 minutes to cook to al dente. The consistency should be really thick.
When the rice is really ready, adjust the seasoning, adding the grated parmesan and a little black pepper and some salt (you may find you do not need any salt at all, depending on how salty your pancetta is), then tip the whole lot into a bowl and leave to cool. Chill thoroughly in the fridge.
Beat the egg in a shallow dish. Tip the breadcrumbs on to a plate. Take generously heaped tablespoons of the cold rice and – wet hands make this easier – roll into balls or flat patties (the shape is up to you). Then drop them into the beaten egg, followed by the breadcrumbs. You should end up with about 30-35 small balls of crumbed rice.
Heat a shallow layer of oil in a frying pan and fry the balls, a few at a time, till they are crisp and browned on all sides.
Give each person about five or six balls, with lemon halves to squeeze over.
Frozen cherry rice
If cherries evade you, try using blackberries, lightly cooked blackcurrants or raspberries instead.
Serves 8
pudding rice 200g
milk 500ml
a vanilla pod
caster sugar 4 tbsp
cherries 200g
double cream 500ml
Directions
Put the rice and milk into a saucepan. Splitthe vanilla pod down its length, scrapeout the sticky seeds inside with thepoint of a knife, then stir them into the milk. Drop in the empty vanilla pod then addthe sugar and bring to the boil. Lower the heat and simmer at a very low bubble for about 20 minutes, till thick and creamy.It is essential to stir from time to time, to stop it sticking. Taste for sweetness – you may need a little more sugar – then leave to cool a little.
Halve and stone the cherries. Whip the cream in a chilled bowl till it is soft and thick. It should be just firm enough to fall slowly off the spoon (if it will stand in peaks you have gone too far) then fold this into the rice mixture along with the halved cherries. Pack into a clingfilm-lined terrine or dish and freeze for about 4 hours.
Serve in thick slices, maybe with a few more cherries on the side. (If you've left it inthe freezer overnight, you may find thatit has set too hard, in which case it will need a good half-hour's defrosting before you can slice it.)
