My Favorite Mushroom Risotto

As I typed that I caught myself saying riz-auto in my head like I'm Chef Ramsey. Have you ever heard him say it? It's just like that.

Anyway, one of my favorite not so healthy indulgences is risotto. I've never had it at a restaurant so I have no comparison as to what it "should" taste like. But, I've made it countless times at home and love it.

Here's the recipe I use as a base - not surprisingly from Martha. I get the sliced baby portobellos from the store to help with the prep work because risotto is a dish of love and labor. It's not one that you can start and walk away from. I've never timed it, but I think it takes about 30 - 40 minutes of constant stirring.



Not a side I make if the husband has to work late.

It's also a great recipe to use any frozen, homemade chicken broth because it calls for like 5-6 cups of chicken broth.

Since the risotto needed serious attention, I baked some salmon and steamed some asparagus to have with it (it also balanced out the meal to be a little healthier). Although, I could eat of bowl of just mushroom risotto by itself.

Yes, it's that good.



And that's what we had the other night.

Here's my adapted version of her recipe:

• 5-6 cups homemade chicken broth
• 1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter
• 1 large shallot, diced small
• 1/2 pound sliced baby portobello mushrooms
• Coarse salt and ground pepper
• 1 cup Arborio rice
• 1/2 cup white cooking wine
• 2 handfuls grated Parmesan (probably about 1/2 cup)
• 3 tablespoons chopped mixed fresh herbs, such as parsley, marjoram, and chives

I'm really wanting to try this recipe next:

Source: thewellfednewlyweds.blogspot.com via Lesley on Pinterest

It's supposed to be a quick version that you can bake!

Creamy Deviled Eggs

I probably should have posted this recipe before Easter, but oh well.

It's my favorite deviled egg recipe and I've been using it for years. I started with Martha's recipe and tweaked it a tad.

Ingredients:
12 eggs
1/3 c mayo
1 T dijon (I always use Jack Daniels Old No. 7)
1 teaspoon vinegar
2 green onions - minced
1/2 dill pickle spear - seeds removed then minced (I always use Claussen Kosher Dill, they're the best)
1/4 teaspoon Louisiana hot sauce
sea salt and fresh ground pepper

Put all your eggs in a pot and cover with water. Bring to a boil then cover and remove from heat. Let stand 12 minutes then put the eggs in cold water.

While the eggs are cooling, make your filling. Combine everything else in a bowl and stir. After your eggs have cooled, take off all the shells (the longest part), slice lengthwise and put the yolks in the mixture.

I use a mixer to mix everything up because it makes it really creamy. Then I spoon it into a ziploc baggie and stick it in the refrigerator, along with the sliced eggs on a covered plate. I've put the filling right in the eggs and then refrigerated it but it always seems to gather condensation and nobody likes wet eggs! So, I just fill the eggs right before serving.

Take out your ziploc baggie, make a small cut in one of the corners and just squeeze out the filling into the eggs. Simple!

In other news, I thought my nice camera was broken so I've been using my point and shoot for the last week. It wouldn't focus and refused to take photos. I finally took it into the camera shop and the sweet little lady told me it was fine and did a couple little setting changes and fixed it. Turns out I somehow changed the focus on it without knowing! Yay for not having to spend a lot of money but head hung in shame for looking like a dork that doesn't know how to use my camera.

Sesame Orange Shrimp

If you have followed this blog for a while, you know I love Martha Stewart's Everyday Food magazine. I love getting that she has pictures of all the recipes and she usually has easy, unique things to try.

Sometimes I have some ingredients on hand that I don't know what to do with and don't really like searching through her books to find a recipe. So instead, I go to her website. I think she publishes most of the recipes online anyway.

I had a bag of frozen shrimp in the freezer so I did a quick search for shrimp recipes and found this one for sesame orange shrimp.

I will say, the shrimp was delicious, however, if you make it, I recommend doubling the sauce recipe and making some noodles to go with it. I made rice but it wasn't the best. I think noodles with extra sauce would have been perfect.



And just because I can, a donut picture. Thanks dad for the dozen Dunkin Donuts! I did share.



Oh, and, since I figured out how to share a pdf file on here, remember these? You can download the file for free here.

Happy Hump Day!