Marit, Marit, what does your garden yield?

Well, there's a courgette or two and a few tomatoes picked the other day. No mushrooms, of course, but foraging through my fridge unearthed a few that didn't go into the lasagna - and they're still good. Great, I can have a risotto, with left-over salmon from yesterday's lunch.

I have had to switch to brown rice, and not too much of that. White rice equals too many carbohydrates turning themselves into sugar and sending me into a deep sleep.


Brown Rice Risotto

Serves 2 (or one portion for now, one for the freezer)

2 small cups brown rice
2 tsp gluten free vegetable stock powder

Wash rice, then add boiling water to cover, and vegetable stock powder.

I left it to simmer while I made Corned Beef Hash for my other half. I had lots of potatoes left from Sunday lunch. You would have thought I was cooking for the whole neighbourhood! As that, too, simmered away, i got on with cooking the rest of the ingredients for the risotto:

1 courgette (Zucchini), cut in half length ways, then sliced
1 onion, finely chopped
A few mushrooms (I wish I had some Chanterelles)
4 small tomatoes*
fillet/steak of salmon, baked (leftovers are fine)
a little grated cheese

Fry onion and courgettes in a little olive oil until softened, then add sliced mushrooms. Cook until the mix is nicely browned and the aroma makes makes your mouth water.
At this stage the rice should be ready. If the rice needs draining (it shouldn't, but happens), use a sieve rather than a colander - to stop half of it going down the sink. It's happened to me a few times.

Add the mix to the pan of rice, then quarter the tomatoes and fry quickly together with the salmon, before adding that too, to the rice. A little grated cheese to taste, and hey presto, a delicious, simple risotto.

* It's funny how I can eat tomatoes grown in the garden, but have bad reactions to shop bought ones.


Did you know… that zucchini has been eaten for several thousand years in Central and South America, but that the zucchini (summer squash) we eat these days was developed in Italy?
Zucchini (zucchino in Italian) means a small squash – and the term squash in turn comes from the Indian word skutasquash: ‘green thing eaten green’. Courgette is simply the French word for zucchini.

Another of Christopher Columbus’s discoveries, I believe.

Why no photo? Risotto isn't exactly the most photogenic dish, is it? Besides, I was hungry!