Awsm Risotto Recipe

Easy as hell, and it impresses everyone that I've ever made it for:

Arborio rice (rule of thumb: 1 cup of rice per 2 people)

• veggie stock (at least a liter and a half)
• an onion
• garlic
• ~300g ricotta

Pretty much any veggies that you have lying around. Off the top of my head, I've used (I've asterisked the highly recommended):

• mushrooms*
• spring onions
• pine nuts (fuckin' love pine nuts)*
• broccoli
• carrots
• green beans
• baby spinach*
• pumpkin*

Throw some oil in a largeish saucepan, fry the onion (diced) and garlic until you get those good smells going. Throw in the rice (uncooked), shake and stir it around until the rice is coated in the garlicy goodness, then pour in some veggie stock until the rice is covered. This shouldn't take much stock, and you'll need plenty of stock remaining for the rest of the recipe.

Stir the risotto almost constantly, adding stock when the rice absorbs nearly all the stock already in the saucepan. Throw in vegies as you go (but not until the rice is at least 1/2 cooked), with the veggies requiring the most cooking time (pumpkin, carrots, etc.) going in earlier, and save the mushrooms, pine nuts and other delicate veggies until just before you take it off the heat. You want to be cutting the pumpkin into bite sized chunks, and it'lll probably break down (don't worry -- this is good!) and amalgamate into the thickness. Holy christ, it's tasty. It's going to thicken up. A lot. This is very good.

Add spices to taste, crumble ricotta over servings, and bam! You're now an AWSM cook.