Mmm, risotto. So versatile. You can have it in the spring, with asparagus and peas, in summer with courgette and lemon, in the autumn with squash and pumpkin, and finally winter with hearty root veg. What other food can be enjoyed year round?
One of my favourite risottos is beetroot. Beetroot is such a cool vegetable. It’s so colourful! If you’re not careful, you can dye yourself pink! And the food you make with it becomes such a rich warm colour. I hear you can use it in desserts with chocolate, but I haven’t yet tried that. But a lovely creamy beetroot risotto just hits the spot.
This risotto is pretty simple to make. I start with ready-cooked beetroot, but if you have raw, just cook it through in the oven first. Chop it into bite sized pieces – the colour will leech into the whole risotto.
You have to stir, a lot. I find it quite relaxing actually. You put one scoop of stock in the pan, stir until it’s all absorbed, and repeat until the rice is cooked. It’s not hard work, it’s just something you can do and let yourself just chill for a while.
I like to add cream in my risotto – I use Oatly cream – but it’s not necessary. You could also add cream cheese or cashew cream if you have any.
(I use this)
Most non-vegan recipes use parmesan so I replaced this with nutritional yeast, but it’s ok to leave out if you can’t find it. I also fry in a mix of vegan butter and olive oil, but again, you can use just olive oil if you like.
Serve it on it’s own, or with some garlic bread.
Beetroot Risotto
Ingredients
- 1 tbsp vegan butter
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 100g cooked beetroot, diced
- 1 onion, chopped
- 1 clove garlic, chopped
- 180g risotto rice
- 1 litre vegetable stock
- 1 tsp dried thyme
- 1 heaped tbsp nutritional yeast
- 50ml cream substitute
Directions
- In a large pan, melt the butter with the olive oil.
- Fry the onion and garlic in the pan until softened, then add the beetroot and rice.
- Fry the rice for 2-3 minutes until it starts to turn translucent.
- Add a ladelful of stock, and stir until the rice absorbs it all.
- Repeat until stock is used up and the rice is soft – about 25 minutes.
- Add the nutritional yeast and the cream and stir through.
- Serve with an extra drizzle of cream.
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