Recipe
Pumpkin and sausage risotto
Risotto is the dish that taught us cooking is also a conversation with the pot. The first time we tried, we walked away to check our phone for thirty seconds, and the rice achieved self-awareness on the bottom of the pan. It welded itself there in a brown crust, stared up at us, and seemed to ask what we thought we were doing with our lives.
We have been making risotto for about fifteen years, and we have never made two identical ones. The rice is always a little different, the stock is always a little different, the day is always a little different, so the risotto is always a little different. This is the one we make in October when the pumpkins appear at the market and the weather turns the kind of cold where you want something that takes forty minutes to make because you have forty minutes of nothing else to do. Our grandmother, who grew up in a village outside Padua in the 1950s and whose family grew their own squash out in the side garden, used to say that pumpkin risotto was the dish that announced the end of summer: once you made your first one, you had crossed into the other half of the year. We think about that every time.
So: put on music, pour yourself a glass of the same wine you are about to add to the pan, and stir. Do not walk away, not even for thirty seconds. Do not check your phone. Risotto is a short act of attention, and forty minutes from now you will have the most comforting thing you can eat in October, the pumpkin going sweet and soft, the sausage crumbling in, the rice glossy with starch. Carnaroli rice if you can find it. Arborio if you can't. Both work.
- Prep 10 min
- Cook 30 min
- Serves 2
- Cost €€
Method
- 1
Warm 1 tbsp of the olive oil in a small pan over medium-high heat. Fry the diced pumpkin with a pinch of salt until softened and a little caramelized at the edges, about 8 minutes. Set aside.
8 min
- 2
In a wide heavy-bottomed pan, warm the remaining olive oil over medium heat. Add the onion and sage, cook until soft and translucent.
5 min
- 3
Add the sausage meat, breaking it up with a wooden spoon, and fry until browned.
5 min
- 4
Tip in the rice and stir for 1 to 2 minutes until the grains turn glassy at the edges.
2 min
- 5
Pour in the wine and stir until it has fully evaporated.
2 min
- 6
Add a ladle of hot stock. Stir occasionally and let it absorb almost fully before adding the next ladle. Keep going like this, ladle by ladle.
14 min
- 7
Halfway through, stir in the cooked pumpkin; it will break down and stain the rice orange, which is what you want.
1 min
- 8
After about 16 minutes of cooking, taste a grain. It should be tender with a tiny firm heart. If it's still chalky, give it another ladle.
1 min
- 9
Off the heat, beat in the cold butter and the parmigiano. Cover, wait 2 minutes. This is the *mantecatura*; skipping it is a crime.
2 min
- 10
Give it one more vigorous stir. The risotto should flow like a slow wave when you tilt the pan. Serve immediately with extra parmigiano and pepper.
1 min
Variations
For a richer autumn version, toast some chopped walnuts and scatter on top (not nut-free anymore, but delicious). Swap the sausage for 80 g diced pancetta if that's what's in the fridge. A spoon of mascarpone in place of the butter at the mantecatura makes it sinful. Leftover risotto is the start of arancini: shape into balls, stuff with mozzarella, coat in breadcrumbs, fry.