The Mediterranean · Volume 01, Butter, Egg Pasta and the Roman Hinge
Risotto alla Milanese
Lombardy
An illustration of the dish, not a photograph of it cooked.
- Time
- 40 minutes
- Researched
- 14 sources cited
- Reviewed
- Not yet reviewed from inside the tradition
- Cooked
- Not yet cooked and reported
Legend, not history: the dish is popularly dated to 1574 and tied to Milan Duomo's construction, and to a glazier's assistant nicknamed Zafferano who was jokingly told he would end up putting saffron in the risotto too, and reportedly did so at a wedding banquet. Treat this as colour, not as the dish's actual origin.
As tradition built it
Serves 4. About 40 minutes.
Ingredients
- 320 g Carnaroli rice
- 1.5 L good stock, kept at a bare simmer
- 60 g butter, divided
- 15 g ox bone marrow
- 1 small onion, finely chopped
- a large pinch saffron threads
- a generous handful grated Parmigiano Reggiano
Method
- Sear the bone marrow in a heavy pan 1 minute per side, then set aside.
- In the same pan, melt half the butter with the onion, soften without colouring.
- Add the rice and toast 2 to 3 minutes, stirring, until the grains are translucent at the edges.
- Begin adding hot stock a ladle at a time, stirring, waiting for each addition to be absorbed before the next.
- Dissolve the saffron in a ladle of hot stock and add it at roughly the midpoint of cooking.
- Return the diced marrow near the end.
- When the rice is al dente, about 18 minutes total, take off the heat and mantecare: beat in the remaining cold butter and a generous handful of Parmigiano, off the heat, until glossy and loose.
Notes
Serve with ossobuco: veal shanks cooked slowly 40 to 50 minutes, stock added gradually, a second, separate saffron application near the end, finished with 40 g butter and 60 g Parmigiano stirred in off the heat.
What a modern chef changes
An acidulated mantecatura, and marrow used twice
Rung 1
Method
- Build an acidulated butter for the mantecatura, after Milanese chef Andrea Berton. Sweat a small amount of finely chopped onion in butter, deglaze with a splash of white wine and a few drops of good vinegar, reduce until nearly dry, then chill this butter solid before using it for the final mantecatura in place of plain butter. The acidity lifts the dish's richness rather than just adding to it.
- Use the marrow twice. Sear it as tradition does for the soffritto, but reserve a second small piece, seared separately just before service, diced fine and scattered over the top rather than stirred through, so its texture survives as a distinct note rather than dissolving into the rice.
- Mantecare properly, not gently. Pull the rice off heat a beat earlier than instinct says, then beat the chilled acidulated butter and Parmigiano in hard, moving the pan in short sharp strokes so the risotto genuinely waves, all'onda, rather than sitting stiff.