Gastrophaude
Recently I’ve been titting around in the kitchen rather a lot. Well, cooking, really, is what I mean. Have a recipe, then. Or receipt as dear old Jennifer Patterson used to insist on saying. Actually, you don’t need it. It’s easy.
Chicken & broccoli risotto.
Stuff it’s handy to have:
Onion. Arborio rice. Wine. Stock. Chicken. Wine. Broccoli. Parmesan. Wine. Crème fraiche. Wine. Black pepper. Wine.
Methodology:
Open bottle of wine. Pour a large glass. Take gulp or two and survey kitchen with proprietorial pride, knowing what culinary miracles will be worked herein. Peel onion. Find this easier said than done with blunt knife. Try again. Try too hard. Observe knife slip from skin of onion into skin of hand holding onion. Yelp. Wonder why knife is not sharp enough to cut onion but is sharp enough to cut finger. Apply plaster. Sharpen knife. Chop onion. Leave chopped up bits of onion in a small heap on edge of chopping board for a moment, admiring your handiwork. Award self with a large glug of wine.
Plop butter into big, heavy-bottomed pan. Reflect on big, heavy-bottomed girls, think briefly about butter, have unsavoury reminder of Brando in Last Tango… Have another slurp to restore nerves. Notice butter is not melting. Realise you should have lit gas. Turn gas tap, humming Flanders & Swann to yourself. Light gas. Singe hairs on knuckles doing so. Observe that these are not manly injuries and start to think up plausibly masculine explanations for them. Notice butter has melted. Remember how foul burnt butter is and quickly sling chopped onion into pan before it’s too late. Watch it sizzle for a moment. Sniff appreciatively. Turn down heat. Stir occasionally until onion is softened.
Add rice. Know that rice is an unquantifiable substance which expands to the point of filling whatever pan you use no matter how much you originally put in in the first place, so don’t bother measuring, safe in the knowledge that there will always be too much. Stir. Chuck a glass of white wine at it. Pour another glass of red wine for yourself. Realise you now have red and white open. Consider your options.
Remember you should have prepared some stock by this point. Turn down heat and hurriedly fill kettle. Rootle around in store cupboard for chicken stock cubes. Crush two or three into second largest pan. Realise that although you filled the kettle you failed to switch it on. Switch it on. Remove largest pan from heat lest the rice/onion/wine mixture burns. Pour yourself a glass of white wine while you’re waiting. Pour boiled water onto stock cubes. Marvel at how this immediately becomes stock and try not to think of professional cooks and chefs weeping at your using stock cubes. Feel guilty that Hugh F-W would have been boiling birds for days. Capable lad, Hugh F-W. Remember that Marco advertises stock cubes and feel better. Chuck a ladleful of stock at the rice/onion/etc., making sure to put it back on the heat first, turned down halfway. Stir rice/etc. gently. Add more stock when first lot has been absorbed. Repeat. Pour glass of wine, red or white, you don’t care anymore. Drink. Repeat. Notice the next 10-15 minutes slip away pleasantly in boozy reverie.
Drop broccoli into what is now more and more resembling a risotto. Add last of the stock. Tear flesh from yesterday’s roast chicken. Add chicken to risotto. Stir. Turn off heat. Put lid on pan. Grate in a huge amount of parmesan. Stir. Add a large dollop of crème fraiche. Stir. Put lid on. Leave to rest while you finish off the wine. Serve. Notice that you have made about half a ton of the stuff. Feel great pride. Bursting, drunken pride. Eat. Doze. Done.
June 21st, 2011 at 8:22 pm
Does it matter which F&S I hum? I only do The Gasman Cometh when my landlady needs to renew my gas safety certificate, so was wondering if Ill Wind or The English, the English, the English are Best would be an acceptable substitute? Will that affect the flavour of the finished dish?
June 21st, 2011 at 11:28 pm
Of course it matters! Imagine how ghastly it would be if you were warbling The Wompom. That said, if you drink as much as I tend to when cooking, you won’t mind.