Hazelnut and Celery Risotto

This is my version of a basic risotto, tweaked for vegan taste-buds and extended to include some of my favourite ingredients. I keep going on about it, but as with most things, risottos benefit greatly from damn good ingredients. If you can, then the Carnaroli or Vialone Nano varieties are two of the best. If not, then Arborio rice can still give good results.

1½ cups hazelnuts
2 onions, finely chopped
3 garlic cloves, minced
5 sticks of celery, finely sliced
2 tbsp olive oil
2 cups Carnaroli rice
2 cups dry white wine
2 pints hot stock
6 ripe, vine tomatoes, finely chopped
2 tbsp fresh marjoram, finely chopped
1 tbsp yeast flakes
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Instructions

Firstly, lightly toast the hazelnuts in a 170ºC oven. Don’t let them get any further than lightly turning brown. Allow to cool a little until the bitter, papery skins can be scrunched away from the nuts and blown away.

Wrap them up in a clean tea towel and gently beat for a little bit with a rolling pin. Let the noise and adrenalin subside. If you’re now sobbing uncontrollably, you’ve got issues and should seek outside help.

Fry the onions, garlic and celery for five minutes in olive oil on a medium heat until the onions are softening. Add the dry rice and continue frying and stirring for a minute or so before adding the wine and turning up the heat, cooking and stirring for a few minutes until absorbed. Stir.

Add the first cup of hot stock, tomatoes, marjoram and the yeast flakes and simmer on a medium heat. Stir…

Keep adding another cup of stock when the one before has been absorbed, until the rice is cooked but still retaining some bite. Don’t stop stirring. This should take around quarter of an hour from the time you put in the first cup of stock. Stir.

As you near the end of cooking, lessen the amount of liquid you’re pouring in. It’s a skill that might take you a couple of goes to get spot on but it’s worth it.
The risotto is ready when the rice is creamy and plump, still retaining some bite with just a little thick creamy liquid between the grains.

Add the hazelnuts and salt and pepper to taste before leaving it to rest with a lid on for a few minutes before serving. You can stop stirring now, by the way.

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Panforte Nero

Panforte Nero is an extremely rich Italian cake/slice from Sienna, needing the restraint of thin slices rather than thick wedges or else the sugar rush might tip you into la la land.   This cake would normally have bee’s puke* in it rather than maple syrup. So if you’re a vegan-who-has-honey type of person then adjust your jars according to the desire for said insect up-chuck*.

*Gross, I know, but I can’t honey-coat the truth any longer.

100g/3½ oz plain chocolate
1 cup white flour
1 tsp ground cinnamon
¼ tsp ground allspice
¾ tsp ginger
½ tsp black pepper
2½cups almonds, lightly toasted and chopped
1 cup chopped mixed peel
⅔ cup light brown sugar
⅓cup maple syrup

Instructions

Set the chocolate to melt over simmering water.

Meanwhile, mix the flour, spices, almonds and chopped mixed peel together in a bowl.

When the chocolate has melted, take off the heat and set aside.

Put the sugar and maple syrup into a small pan and bring to the boil over a medium heat. Now either use a cooking thermometer to determine when the mixture is at soft ball stage, at around 118ºC/235ºF, or drop a little into a small dish of cold water where it should solidify but still stay soft. It all happens quicker than you might think so be ready.

Immediately take off the heat and stir into the dry mix together with the melted chocolate. The mixture will immediately start to thicken so do it quickly.

Scrape out into a greased, lined 7 inch spring-form baking tin and smooth out the top as much as possible.

Place in a 150ºC oven and bake for about forty minutes. The top should be slightly cracking.

Allow to cool for half an hour before loosening the edge of the cake with a knife and lifting out of the tin.

Remove the base of the tin and allow to fully cool.

Sprinkle with icing sugar and serve.

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One for Sorrow, Two for Joy and One for Luck… The Magic of Numbers



“Good morrow Mistress Magpie…” Now turn three times anti-clockwise… one, two, three… spit. That should do it. Phew. You’re safe.   As the bird flies into the distance, ask yourself what on earth were you doing. Not sure? Well, you were using politeness coupled with the magic of numbers to prevent the magpie’s inherent bad energy attaching to your luck gland and destroying any chance you had of finally courting Elsie the tanner’s daughter or Arthur the baker’s lad. Numbers have power. As do magpies. Watch them for long enough and you’ll see them busy at work cursing the rest of nature with badness too. And nature can’t count like we can and is unaware of politeness, so any weasels, badgers or bumble bees are defenceless against the magpie’s evil might.

In Glastonbury, when someone changes their name from a normal one like David or Louise to a better one that they feel fits their personality, like Aura Brightstar*, care has been taken to get the numerical value of the letters just right. After all, every letter that makes up every word in the universe corresponds to a magical number. When all those letters are added up together, the resulting number reveals which names are magically powerful and which are not. It does, it really does. Choose a New Age name with the right number and it will lend that power to you. Three, for instance, is why the names Isis, Star and Willow resonate like a singing bowl, calling down angels and other ethereal beings of light into the heart-chakra. Terry, Steve and Cheryl on the other hand just don’t. At all. Ever. This wonderful and important study of names and numbers is called Numerology and is definitely not silly.
  Children growing up in Glastonbury often get a head-start, starting off with numerically significant names like Peace or Merlin. In later years it’s common for them to take other names like Paul or Shelley instead, completely ignoring the negative numerological implications of their actions in the excitement of finally moving away to London.

*Funnily enough, parents everywhere, even New Age ones, exhibit the same disbelief and refusal to accept the decision of their dearest flower to change their given name.
“We called you Moss Chakra-light and that’s your name. It’s a beautiful name. Do you want to give your birth-father an energy blockage? I think you need to be with yourself for a bit and meditate until you stop all this silliness, even though we both acknowledge your truth and your journey. Go on, up to your sleeping platform...”