Rice cooked with sliced mushrooms, white wine, garlic, spring onion and thyme in vegetable broth, finished with parmesan. Thirty-five minutes, three servings.
The mushrooms come out of the pan
The first step fries the mushrooms on their own and then removes them, and it is easy to read that as an unnecessary extra pan.
It is not. Mushrooms are mostly water and they release it as soon as they meet heat. Put them straight into the pot with the rice and that water goes into the pot too, which means the grains steam instead of toasting and the finished rice is soft and slightly grey.
Fried alone until the water has gone and they have taken colour, they concentrate and stay in recognisable pieces. Then they go back in with the rice for the flavour without the liquid.
It looks like a risotto and is not
Toast the rice in oil, add wine, let it evaporate, add broth. Those are the opening moves of a risotto and anyone who has made one will recognise them.
Then it stops. The broth goes in all at once rather than a ladle at a time, and the pot is covered and left alone rather than stirred continuously.
The difference is what you want at the end. Stirring rice releases its starch into the liquid, which is what makes a risotto creamy. Here the point is loose separate grains, so the stirring stops when the broth goes in.
Let the wine go
A hundred grams of white wine, poured in after the rice has been toasted, and left to bubble until the smell of alcohol has gone.
That instruction is worth following. Rice absorbs whatever liquid is in the pot, and wine that has not had time to cook off gets absorbed raw, which leaves a sharp edge in the grain that the broth cannot cover.
Half a minute of bubbling is usually enough. You can smell when it has changed.
Two to one, and then leave it
Five hundred grams of broth to 250 of rice is a clean ratio and it is worth trusting.
Once it is in, bring it to the boil, then turn the heat low and leave it for fifteen minutes with the lid on. Do not lift it to check and do not stir. Every time the lid comes off, steam that was cooking the rice leaves the pot.
The parmesan goes in at the very end, off the fiercest heat, and gets stirred through gently just long enough to melt.
More rice
- Colombian white rice — the plain one.
- Arroz verde — with spinach.
- Arroz con coco titoté — the sweet one.
- Chicken in mushroom sauce — the same mushrooms.
Mushroom Rice FAQ
Because they release a lot of water. Cooked in the pot with the rice, that water stops the grains toasting and the whole dish turns soft. Fried alone until golden and added back, they keep their texture.
Five hundred grams of broth to 250 of rice, which is exactly two to one by weight, or about two cups to a cup and a quarter. That gives rice that stays loose.
No, but give it a moment to bubble off if you do. Raw wine absorbed into the grain is sharp. Without it, add a little more broth.
No. It uses the same first steps, toasting the rice and adding wine, but then the liquid goes in all at once and the pot is left alone. A risotto is stirred constantly to release starch; this is deliberately not.
Not once the broth is in. Stirring rice releases starch and makes it creamy, which is right for a risotto and wrong here.
Because whoever wrote it weighed everything. It is not wrong, and for water and broth grams and millilitres are interchangeable, so 500 g is 500 ml, about two cups.
It is marked optional. It adds salt and richness at the end, but the mushrooms, thyme and wine carry the dish without it, which also makes it suitable for anyone avoiding dairy.
📖 Recipe
Ingredients
- 250 g rice (about 1¼ cups)
- 200 g mushrooms (sliced)
- 500 g vegetable broth or water (about 2 cups)
- 100 g white wine (about ½ cup)
- 4 tablespoons oil (two for the mushrooms, two for the rice)
- 2 garlic cloves
- 1 spring onion
- 1 tablespoon thyme
- ½ cup parmesan cheese (optional)
- Salt and pepper to taste
Notas
Instructions
- In a pan, heat 2 tablespoons of oil over medium heat. Once it is hot, add the sliced mushrooms and fry them until they have given up their water and turned golden. Take them out and set them aside.
- In a pot, with the other two tablespoons of oil, soften the finely chopped garlic and spring onion. Add the mushrooms and then the rice.
- Stir everything so the grains take on the oil and the flavour, then pour in the white wine and let it bubble until the smell of alcohol has gone.
- Add the vegetable broth and the thyme and bring it to the boil over medium heat.
- Once the rice has taken up the broth, turn the heat down low.
- Leave it for another 15 minutes, and just before you turn it off, stir in the parmesan if you are using it. Give it a moment for the cheese to melt.
- Serve it hot.
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