Roasted Carrot Risotto

Serves 4

Ingredients:

• 1 bunch of carrots

• Olive Oil

• Salt and Pepper to taste

• 2 shallots, diced

• 1 c arborio rice

• 5 c. vegetable broth

• 4 T butter

• 1/2 c white wine

• Grated parmesan cheese

• 1 bunch fresh Parsley

Preheat the oven to 400 F

Peel the carrots, separate the greens, and put then in a roasting pan. Save the greens for later. Drizzle some olive oil and salt and pepper. Roast in the oven for 45 minutes. Once the carrots are fork-tender, remove from the oven and puree in the food processor or blender. If carrots are too pasty, add some water or vegetable broth to thin the mixture. Set aside.

Start the risotto. Bring the broth to a simmer. In a larger pot, add a drizzle of olive oil and half of the butter into the pot and add the diced shallots. Cook until translucent. Add the arborio rice and toast until translucent, too. When the rice has been toasted, deglaze the pot with white wine and allow to cook down. Add 1/2 c of the broth to the rice gradually, waiting until the rice has absorbed all of the liquid before adding another 1/2 c. Use all of the broth, stirring regularly. By the time you use all of the broth, the rice should be tender and done.

When the rice is done, add your carrot puree and stir until combined. Then add the remaining butter and parmesan cheese to finish. Chop the carrot greens and use as a garnish.

The Story of How I Cooked for 60 people

Grandma turned 90 last year and it was a big deal.
She's not my grandma by blood, but she is my best friend's grandma. To celebrate, the family planned a big party with people coming into town from all over the place. A celebration worthy of a really remarkable woman.

I'm not sure how it happened, but I came on board to make dinner.

The menu evolved over a couple of months, thinking about what parts of Sunday dinners we thought Grandma would appreciate. Here's what we came up with:

There were timelines and shopping lists and chatgpt prompts to scale up each recipe to feed 60 people. I spent the week prior making ricotta gnocchi by hand to feed as many. Sixty people include just the family! It's chaotic and awesome. Spending time down with her family is sort of like a magical time warp. Feeding that many people has to be organized. Normally, we're all about the buffet, but for this special occasion we had a several tables set up and the kitchen roped off for a sit down, family style event. This included kicking Grandma out of the kitchen several times. Each table had a "captain" that collected the dishes, brought them to the table, and explained each part of the meal. It was a giant team undertaking and an event that I look back on fondly.

Transparently, I had never cooked for that many before and I learned a lot. We ended up with a lot of risotto left over. But there's a lot you can do with leftover risotto, including making some delicious arancini. Maybe I'll put that recipe together in a later post.