I picked up a small fresh looking but American Black Truffle so I thought I’d cook up some risotto and see how it would taste.  This risotto is a well seasoned risotto but not over seasoned. It pretty easy to prepare risotto. It takes about twenty minutes of slowly adding ingredients and a lot of stirring. I normally don’t add cream or butter to my style of risotto but used them here because they pair well with truffles. Leftover risotto does not reheat well and you might want to make rice balls with whatever risotto that’s left. It turns out that the American Truffle was better than a canned or bottled truffle but not anywhere up there with Australian Truffles. I’ve read that Italian White Alba Truffles are considered to be the finest and most expensive. But I only remember tasting Australian Truffles from restaurants I’ve visited. Sorry for the poor photos. For whatever reason the risotto was next to impossible for me to capture with my iPhone and turned everything yellow without the colors that it had.

Ingredients for about 6 servings

3 cups mushroom stock (your stock should be hot for preparing risotto)

2 cups arborio rice

1 medium sized sweet onion – finely chopped

1 garlic clove – mashed to paste

1 Calabrian Chile – chopped fine – stem removed

2 oz. sweet butter – room temperature

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil – maybe extra for serving

1 cup dry white wine

1 cup heavy cream

1 cup parmigiana reggiano

1/2 teaspoon dry thyme

1/4 teaspoon dry basil

1/4 teaspoon dry oregano

1/4 teaspoon dry rosemary

pinch saffron

a few grates fresh nutmeg

fresh ground black pepper to taste

pinch ground white pepper

at least .05 of a pound of fresh truffle

Directions

Get your sauce pot on medium high heat and add the butter, olive oil and, chile, onions, rice and stir until the onions are translucent.

Next add wine and stir until wine is absorbed.

Add a cup of stock and garlic and stir until stock is absorbed.

Add a cup or less of stock stirring till absorbed and continue till done with stock.

Add remaining herbs, spice, cheese and a cup of heavy cream.

It should look like this. Taste test and check that the rice is firm and cooked through. Add fresh ground sea salt and pepper to taste.

Serve immediately with shaved truffles. Garnish with a little extra olive oil if desired.

You will impress people with this one. It’s luxurious and delicious!