Recipe
Radicchio and gorgonzola risotto with walnuts
If you want to understand the north of Italy in one plate of food, make this risotto. Radicchio is the bitter red-purple chicory that grows around Venice and Treviso and looks like God's answer to the question what if lettuce, but angry. Gorgonzola is the blue cheese from the hills north of Milan that smells like a gym bag from a distance and tastes like velvet up close. Put the two together with rice and butter and a shower of toasted walnuts, and you have the best argument for moving to the Veneto in winter that we have ever encountered.
We discovered this combination in our first year of university, at a canteen in a small town where the lady behind the counter had exactly four main dishes and rotated them based on what was in season. On Wednesdays in November she did this risotto, and by our third week we were scheduling our Wednesday lectures around getting to the canteen before the radicchio risotto ran out. One Wednesday we didn't make it, and the student in front of us took the last portion, and we nearly cried in the pasta queue. We went home and made our own version that evening out of sheer spite, using cheap gorgonzola from the supermarket and a head of radicchio that had seen better days, and it was actually pretty good. We have been making it in the cold months ever since.
Three warnings. First, this is a special-occasion dish, or a very-sad-evening dish, but not an everyday dish, because risotto wants attention and gorgonzola wants money. Second, use the soft, sweet gorgonzola dolce rather than the sharp piccante: the radicchio is already bringing bitterness and you don't need the cheese piling on. Third, for the love of everything, toast the walnuts. Raw walnuts in a risotto taste like homework; toasted walnuts taste like a decision you'd make again. Pour yourself a glass of something red and Venetian, and stir.
- Prep 10 min
- Cook 30 min
- Serves 2
- Cost €€
Method
- 1
Toast the walnut halves in a dry pan over medium heat, tossing often, until they smell fragrant and the skins start flaking. Tip onto a plate to cool, then chop roughly.
4 min
- 2
Warm 2 tablespoons of the olive oil in a wide heavy-bottomed pan over medium heat. Add the onion with a pinch of salt and cook until soft and translucent.
5 min
- 3
Add the sliced radicchio and stir until it wilts and loses its brightness, going rust-red.
4 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 red wine and stir until it has fully evaporated. The pan will look dark and gloriously sticky.
2 min
- 6
Add a ladle of hot stock. Stir occasionally until mostly absorbed. Keep adding stock one ladle at a time.
16 min
- 7
After about 16 minutes of cooking, taste a grain. It should be tender with a firm pinpoint heart. If still chalky, give it another ladle.
1 min
- 8
Off the heat, beat in the cold butter, the gorgonzola cubes, and the parmigiano. Cover the pan and wait 2 minutes.
2 min
- 9
Give it one last vigorous stir. It should flow like a slow wave when you tilt the pan. If it's stiff, splash in a little more hot stock.
1 min
- 10
Serve immediately, topped with the toasted walnuts, a crack of black pepper, and a tiny thread of raw olive oil.
1 min
Variations
Long-leaf Treviso radicchio is more bitter and more elegant; round Chioggia is milder and easier to find. For a meatier version, crisp 60 g of diced pancetta with the onion. A splash of balsamic vinegar at the end cuts the richness if it feels too heavy. If gorgonzola scares you, try taleggio, which is milder and melts beautifully. Leftover risotto is the start of the best fried arancini of your life.