Fresh peas from the pod are one of the great gifts of late Spring, even raw, fresh out of the pod, their taste is a promise of Summer. Eating peas at their best seems quite a hard task if you don't have a garden, at least according to Bruce Cole of Sautee Wednesday (or should I say MFK Fisher?). I'm not so lucky, very much so, as it happens to be. I have no garden and I hardly ever manage to find any fresh peas in the pod on sale around here. Everyone seems to be buying frozen so there's no market, according to one of the greengrocers I usually shop from. I have to admit that's quite understandable: frozen peas are, compared to other frozen veggies, those who lose less in the process. The Independent had an interesting article on the subject last year. For some cosmic coincidence or maybe as a gift from the cooking gods (there must be some, right?) I managed to find some organic pod-peas on sale at a somewhat exaggerated price. I ignored the price and Daniela's comments and bought a kilo. What to do with them? Had I had any chance of finding baby cuttlefish I would have gone for seppioline e piselli. Not likely. Instead I opted for a recipe that radiates pea-ness, risi e bisi.
There are many good risi e bisi recipes but there are loads of bad ones. Risi e bisi is essentially a rice and pea dish between a soup and a risotto. It is made with the risotto technique but it is left quite wet. There's no cream in it, whatever Emeril says. I know, having a go at Emeril is so widespread it ain't cool anymore, but I just couldn't resist. A rather more authentic recipe is this one from Mario Batali. My own recipe is quite close but has two major differences. I don't use prosciutto in the beginning cooking stages but rather lean pancetta. Cooking prosciutto is, in my book, a serious waste of prosciutto. What makes this cured meat so delicious is its velvety texture and incredible aroma: once cooked both are gone. If I really wanted prosciutto in my risi e bisi I'd rather take a thick slice, separately chop fat and lean layer and then use the fat for the initial cooking (what we Italians call soffritto) and add the diced lean prosciutto to the finished dish just before serving. The other change in my recipe is in the stock. Instead of using a chicken or meat stock, as often the case, I make a vegetable stock using the pea pods and aromatics (onion, carrot, celery and some peppercorns). Once ready the stock is filtered and the pods passed through a food mill. I only do this if I manage to get some organic peas otherwise I'd stick to the meat stock. The pea pod enriched stock gives the dish a particular taste and aroma which enriches the dish.
Risi e bisi
serves four
750 g (26 oz) peas in the pod, organic
onion, carrot, celery and peppercorns for the stock
2 spring onions (not a scallion but one of those young round onions with the green par still attached), finely chopped
50 g lean pancetta (about 2 oz), diced
250 g (about 9 oz) Vialone nano rice or, missing that, any other risotto rice
75 g (2.5 oz)Parmigiano Reggiano, grated
50 g (1.8 oz) butter
1/2 glass dry white wine
2 Tbsp EV olive oil
Shell the peas and set them aside. Rinse the pods and put them in a pot with some onion, celery, carrot and a few peppercorns. Add water (about 1.5-2 litres), bring to boil then reduce to a simmer and continue simmering for one hour. Pass the stock through a sieve. Throw away onion, celery, carrot and peppercorns. Pass the pods through a food mill and add the "pulp" that comes out to the stock. Pour into a fitting pot and heat slowly till almost boiling. While the stock heats heat the olive oil with the pancetta cubes over medium-low heat. Once the pancetta fat turns from white to translucent add the chopped spring onions. Ideally the onion should cook, without browning in the time the pancetta needs to render some of its fat. Once the onion is soft add the pea, a little stock and cover continuing cooking for about 10 minutes. Add the rice and stir to toast the rice grains as for a risotto. Once the rice is coated in fat pour the wine, wait till most of it is absorbed and start adding the hot stock, stirring the rice and adding more stock from time to time. You should have enough stock to get the proper degree of "wetness": once the rice is still al dente the risi e bisi should look like a quite wet risotto, very all'onda as Italians would say. Add parmesan and butter, stir and serve hot, sprinkled with some chopped parsley if you like.
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