This recipe is a Venetian classic, based on an Elizabeth David classic recipe with some delicious twists contributed by word of mouth by some very well known Sydney chefs who my husband Adrian hangs out with.
Here’s the Elizabeth David recipe:
The big difference of course is using frozen peas which don’t take as long to cook, so to recreate a bit more pea flavour, I added some of the frozen peas to the onion mixture and cook along with the rice, in addition to adding peas towards the end as well.
Adding seafood to this dish is optional but makes for a lovely meal in itself. The sweetness of the peas and the creamy texture along with prawns and calamari flavours is delish!
For 2 people as a main course:
Ingredients:
1/2 onion finely diced
50-60g fatty pancetta diced
50g butter
1 cup Arborio or carnali rice (round rice)
500ml chicken stock
250ml water
3 cloves of garlic
1.5 cup frozen peas
6-8 raw peeled and deveined prawns
150g thinly sliced calamari rings
Grated Parmesan
Method:
1. Melt 40g butter along with pancetta and cook gently in flat bottomed pot until pancetta fat starts to melt.
2. Add onion, garlic and cook until starting to soften, add half a cup of frozen peas and cook until peas and 1/2 cup stock and cook until pea “start to absorb the stock, fat and butter”. Smash peas with the back of a wooden spoon or fork to release pea flavour into the cooking liquid, simmer until liquid evaporates and butter/fat is “evident” again.
3. Add 1 cup rice and mix gently to cover grains of rice in butter fat mixture, then add 1.5 cups stock and simmer without stirring much until liquid just starts to disappear, stir and add then add 1 cup of water and simmer again.
4. Check rice to see if just cooked, add more water if necessary, then add rest of the peas, prawns and calamari and simmer for 5-6 minutes until peas and prawns just cooked through.
5. stir through the rest of the butter and half a cup of grated parmesan cheese, and serve either wedge of lemon, and extra parmesan, pepper on the side.
