Traditional Italian risotto with sweet peas and cheese recipe

Risotto. That’s one of the first recipes that I learned from my mom. I saw her stirring and stirring the risotto for exactly 18 minutes hundreds and hundreds of times. She shared with me some secrets on how to make it more creamy or tasty and today I’m sharing with you this family recipe, a traditional one from Northern Italy.

We are going to prepare a vegetarian risotto, with fresh sweet peas and cheese, but there are tons of ways to cook risotto: with meat (with sausage is amazing!!), with veggies, with fish (oh, wow, that’s sooo good) and even with strawberries!

Risotto is a very kid friendly recipe. As we are cooking for children I did some changes to the original recipe without loosing anything in taste or texture: I’m using extra virgin oil of olive and cheese instead of butter and I’m not using any wine.

See you next Thursday with a new recipe from BuonaPappa!

5 Comments

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  • Reply
    Wennie
    March 22, 2013 at 12:04 pm

    Hi Barbara,

    I love your blog/website. It is wonderful,great job.I am looking forward to try this sweet pea risotto recipe for my daughter who is turning one next week. I have a couple questions about the recipe.

    1. Do you use all 10 cups of the vegetable stocks?
    2. Have you try adding mushroom to this recipe?
    3. How do you prepare your vegetable stocks?

    Thanks again.I hope she will love it.

    • User Avatar
      Reply
      Barbara Lamperti
      March 22, 2013 at 9:15 pm

      Hi Wennie!
      I’m so glad you like BuonaPappa, I really enjoy sharing my recipes with other moms and I’m happy when I hear that other kids like the same recipes that I prepare for my little Luca.
      Risotto.
      1. Considering the amount of rice I used (1.5 lb) I suggested 10 cups of vegetable stock. No, I didn’t use all of them, almost one cup was left in the pan.I usually prepare more stock than really needed (1/2 cups more) as I do not want to remain without stock right at the end of the rice cooking time. Sometimes the ingredients I use (either veggies or meat) absorb the stock in a different way, that’s why the extra 1/2 cups. As you can see from the video I add 1/2 ladles at a time and I let the rice absorb the stock before adding more. Three minutes before the cooking time (so, after 15 min from when you put the rice in the pan) I stop adding stock because I do not want the risotto to be too liquid once cooked.
      2. Yes, and it’s a very yummy addition! I didn’t use mushrooms as they recommend to insert mushrooms in kids diet at least after 2 yrs (somebody suggests even 3 yrs). Those are just recommendations to avoid possible allergies. It doesn’t mean that you cannot try giving mushrooms to your toddler before 2 or 3.
      If you want to try the mushroom version I would suggest to use any kind of mushroom with a strong taste. In Italy I love using porcini or gallette, here in California I tried a japanese kind called Shiitake and the local Portobello with a nice result.I would not recommend using the white or champignon mushrooms as they give texture but no taste at all.
      3. Vegetable stock. I made a video about it, I think it was one of the first ones 😉
      have a look at it and let me know if you need any further information
      https://www.buonapappa.net/vegetable-broth/

      I hope I was helpful, have a lovely day and let me know if your little daughter will like the risotto!
      ciao, Barbara

  • Reply
    Carole
    March 28, 2013 at 9:51 pm

    Hi there. The current Food on Friday on Carole’s Chatter is collecting links to dishes using peas and/or green beans. I do hope you link this in. This is the link . Please do check out some of the other links – there are some good ones already. Cheers

  • Reply
    Carole
    March 29, 2013 at 3:30 am

    Barbara, thanks for joining in the Food on friday fun. I hope to see you again soon! Happy Easter

    • User Avatar
      Reply
      Barbara Lamperti
      March 29, 2013 at 3:56 am

      Hi Carole,
      my pleasure!
      Happy Easter to you too,
      ciao

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