Shrimp Risotto

It's hard for me to believe that less than a week ago that I was walking the streets of Greece.🇬🇷  More like hiking the mountains in Greece.  🏔🤣  I don't know why it feels like such a distant memory -- I'm still falling asleep on the couch before 7:00 every night. ✈️😴😅 #jetlagisnojoke

I had a lot of great meals in Greece but there were 2 that stood out as exceptional.  A masterfully prepared Grilled Octopus in Santorini and in Athens, I had a Risotto with Shrimps that I ate until I was so full, I couldn't take another bite. 🐙🦐 (Yes, Greeks use shrimps ​as the plural version of the word.)  They were so good that I'm still thinking about how delicious those meals were.  The only problems is that my favorite Greek culinary creations are available exclusively at restaurants 6000 miles away from my house. 😩

My only option is to try and recreate the memorable restaurant meals at home, which is always a little risky.  Even if I do manage to get my hands on the ingredients and adjust the flavors and seasonings just right - it's won't taste the same if I'm not dining al fresco at a table looking out over the crystal blue Agean Sea. 😅  It's probably better that I just make MY version of Shrimp Risotto.  A meal served at my kitchen table with "seasonal" lake views and loosely based on the meal that I enjoyed so much in Greece. 😂

Creating a complex flavor profile in risotto is easy.  Vegetables, spices, even fruits can all be incorporated to make a tasty risotto.  Finding the right combination of those things is infinitely more difficult.  Starting with a risotto flavor packed seemed like a better way to start the process of trying to recreate the shrimp and risotto meal that I remembered.  I used a mushroom risotto pack from World Market. 

Shrimp Risotto
3-4 cups chicken broth
2 Tablespoons olive oil
1 cup Arborio rice
1 cup dry white wine
1 pound shrimp (uncooked, peeled & deveined )
2 Tablespoons butter 
1 Tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 shallots, finely chopped
salt and pepper 
3 green onions, thinly sliced 

Warm broth in a small saucepan and keep warm.  

Heat oil in dutch oven.  Saute shallots for 2 minutes.  

Add rice and saute until toasted. 

Pour in wine and cook until evaporated.

Ladle 1/4 c. chicken broth a time into rice and stir until evaporated. 

Continue until rice is cooked - about 20 minutes. 

Melt butter in skillet.  Add garlic and saute 1 minute.

Add shrimp and Worcestershire sauce and cook until shrimp are fully cooked.

Chop shrimp into pieces and stir into cooked risotto.

Garnish risotto with green onions. 

Ending the blog today with a few pictures of some of our favorite restaurants in Greece.

Ciao!

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