Easy Eats: All-in-one oven-baked chorizo risotto

Love risotto but don't have the time to stand and stir? Sam Parish has you covered with this all-in-one oven-baked version. Photo: Sam Parish

We’re all in for this risotto—no standing over the stove stirring, because midweek we haven’t got time for it! This recipe takes the fuss out of a delicious meal and keeps the active cooking to a minimum, letting the oven do all the work. Feel free to tweak the additions with your favourites, like pork and fennel sausage, mushrooms, or even hot-smoked salmon. Keep the base risotto and make it your own.

Serves: 4 / Prep time: 10 minutes / Cooking time: 30 minutes

Ingredients

• 400g fresh chorizo sausages, casings removed
• 2 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 Tbsp smoked paprika
• 1 chicken stock pot or cube (crumbled, if in cube form)
• 1 ½ cups Arborio rice
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 30g Parmesan, finely grated, plus extra to serve
• 50g butter
• 1 tsp cracked pepper
• Finely grated zest and juice of 1 lemon
• 2 cups frozen minted peas
• 2 Tbsp pesto
   

Method

Preheat your oven to 180°C.

Boil the kettle with at least 1.5 litres of water.

Squeeze the sausage meat out of the casings onto a tray and discard the casings. Break apart the sausage meat, scatter with paprika, and drizzle with olive oil.

Pour 4 cups (1 litre) of hot water from the kettle into a lidded casserole dish. Add the stock cube or pot and stir to dissolve. Add the rice, onion, and garlic.

Cover the dish with the lid (or use the sausage tray to cover) and place towards the top of the oven, along with the tray of sausages. Cook for 30–35 minutes, or until the rice is just cooked but still slightly al dente. Don’t worry if it looks a bit liquidy—that’s good!

Remove the lid and add the parmesan, butter, lemon zest, pepper, juice, and frozen peas. Stir until the mixture becomes creamy. Return lid and let it stand for four minutes for peas to just cook through in the residual heat, then fold through the baked sausage.

Spoon into bowls and top with a generous dollop of pesto and an extra scattering of Parmesan.

Photo: Sam Parish

Sam Parish is a Christchurch-based chef, writer and food stylist. Her food philosophy is ‘maximum of flavour, minimum of fuss’ (MOFMOF), which means she’s all about cooking smarter, not harder. She’ll be sharing delicious, fast, family-friendly food ideas every Wednesday (after road-testing them on her own whānau, of course). Sam’s first book, Cook Me is out now.