This is one of our family recipes that we made every winter when I was a kid, and still to this day we all get together to make it. In fact it can be interactive as everyone should take a turn stirring the pot! It is not a traditional risotto recipe, it is a meat sauce with rice cooked into it. So delicious and tastes like home,
Ingredients:
1 lb ground beef
1 lb Italian sausage, cut up into small discs
4-5 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 cup red wine
28oz can tomato puree, plus ½ can worth water
4 small cans tomato paste, plus 3 cans of water per can
1 32 oz box chicken broth plus equal amount of water
1 lb long grain white rice or medium grain Calrose rice
2 bay leaves
Onion powder
Dried or fresh basil, to taste
Fresh ground pepper, to taste
In a short wide pot brown ground beef, sausage and garlic. Deglaze the pan with wine.
Add puree, tomato paste and water and stir to combine. Add seasonings and simmer on stove for 3 hours on low. Stir every 15 minutes.
In a separate saucepan heat chicken broth and water on medium to low heat.
Add all of the rice to the tomato sauce and add a couple ladles of hot chicken broth. Stir the rice constantly so it doesn't stick to the bottom. Once broth feels like it is absorbed into the rice and it is tough to stir, add a couple more ladles of chicken broth. Repeat process for about 45 minutes until the rice is cooked. (taste test for no crunch!)
Serve on a plate spread out with grated Romano cheese on top.
Recipe borrowed from: Francis Gremmo (my dad)