Vegan Risotto with Mushrooms and Samphire Recipe

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• Vegan risotto with mushrooms and samphire recipe

Delicious, creamy, vegan risotto with gorgeous mushrooms and samphire - the perfect Italian Japanese fusion recipe to impress your friends and family any day of the week.

Risotto is one of those exceptional dishes that is a magical mix between comfort food and something quite sophisticated. On the one hand, you have a bowl of creamy rice which is easy to prepare but on the other hand, you have decadent flavours such as truffle, porcini or saffron, to mention a few luxury ingredients that are often used in risottos which regularly make appearances on a good menu. 

Our twist on a vegan risotto

Perhaps one of the most traditional go-to risotto recipes would be a mushroom risotto, but this recipe goes one step further by introducing a plant-based seafood aspect too used predominantly in Japanese cuisine in the form of dashi.

Coming courtesy, not of fruit-de-mer but légume-de-mer, otherwise known as seaweed, we use an incredible, highly flavoured stock made by steeping dried kombu seaweed in boiling water. This stock, known as dashi, has a rich complex flavour that adds a refined, fresh yet rich flavour to dishes. Adding an umami-rich organic mushroom stock helps bring together the flavours of the ingredients in this vegan risotto. The rice absorbs all of this rich seaweed flavour with the mushroom to showcase an incredible dish with origins in both Japan and Italy. 

We have found that the flavours and ingredients used predominantly in Japanese cuisine as well as many of the cooking techniques go hand in hand with much of the Italian ingredients and styles of cooking. Ingredients such as rice and mushrooms are prevalent in both, so why not marry up these flavours and use other ingredients that often enhance their flavours in each cuisine and mix up the techniques used to cook them. Hence we have strong ingredients such as seaweed, shiitake, miso and soy sitting alongside the more traditional Italian risotto gems such as arborio rice and woodland mushrooms but making a completely new and exciting dish.

Showstopper mushrooms

The presentation too is a showstopper. Using baked king oyster mushrooms as a stalk for a large flat mushroom to sit on makes it appear as though one giant edible mushroom sits on your plate as well as using samphire to resemble the forest floor you would find it on. That, with its waterside origin, samphire pairs well with the dashi and adds a salty flavour to mix well with the Parmesan you will almost certainly want to grate on to at the end. Along with the sophisticated smooth rice, it is certainly a playful plate of food worthy of any dinner party or if not, just a great dinner for any night.

This recipe follows a very traditional technique of making a risotto which starts by creating a stock which would normally be a vegetable stock but in this case it is the dashi/seaweed stock enriched with mushroom which is soaked up little by the risotto rice on the hob.

The stock will take just a little bit more time to prepare than a traditional cubed stock as the kombu kelp will develop in flavour the longer you leave it. Pre-made dashi can be used if you want to save on time.

Risotto rice varaties

Traditional risotto is made with short-grain rice that is high in starch, low in amylose and highly absorbent. Arborio rice is easily sourced in most supermarkets and the most common rice used but if you are able to find other varieties such as carnaroli, maratelli and vialone nano, these are considered the best grains to use. Short-grained rice differs from longer-grained varieties due to the amount of starch they contain as when they absorb liquid, they release this starch into the surrounding sauce which gives risotto its familiar creamy texture even when there has been no cream introduced. 

The traditional starter ingredients of shallot and some garlic are finely chopped and added to a frying pan with a little bit of decent olive oil to soften. This stage will only take a couple of minutes then it is ready for you to add the risotto rice to coat in all the glistening hot oil. Stirring the rice in the oil so that there is a fine layer of fat over each grain, which is known as tostatura in Italy, will prepare the rice perfectly for the liquids.

Once nicely translucent, simply add in some white wine or white vermouth. White wine is traditional and adds a depth of flavour and decadence or the Vermouth adds a more herbal and sweeter flavour. Then add ladle by ladle, the stock ensuring that each ladle full has been nicely absorbed by the rice before adding the next. The stirring motion for a traditional risotto is important as it is this action that disturbs the starches which coat each rice grain and gives this vegan risotto dish its signature creamy texture. It is at this point you have created a classic risotto (albeit, one with seaweed stock) which will have the perfect texture ready to add your embellishments.

 

The best vegan risotto fusion

The fusion aspect now comes from the addition of the mushrooms and samphire which are chopped and fried in a separate pan with the added Japanese ingredients of soy and miso. You can add a little grated fresh ginger too at this step or even a little bit of kimchi if you want even more Asian flavours. This is then stirred into the rice before serving. However, the pièce de résistance for this risotto is the addition of what looks like a giant mushroom which sits proudly upon the dish as though it has sprouted out of it. The effect is great and really easy to accomplish. Simply mix a little olive oil with some miso and soy and brush over a large field mushroom or portobello mushroom and a king oyster mushroom per person and bake in the oven for ten or so minutes until cooked (but still slightly al dente so that they keep their shape).

Make it look impressive

When serving our vegan risotto recipe simply cut the top of the king oyster mushroom so that it is flat and press it into a mound of the risotto to ensure it stays vertical, then just balance the large field or portobello mushroom on top (you can use a cocktail stick if it doesn’t balance well) and voila. You can garnish with sesame oil, coriander or togarashi seasoning, or simply with grated vegan Parmesan.  

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